By Juan Pedro Marín Arrese, in Madrid | Markets around the world are flooded with huge loads of fresh cash pumped in by central banks. The balance sheets of central banks have tripled since 2008. And yet monetary supply is lagging behind. Don’t put the blame on banks. Their assets are shrinking as a result of the massive reshuffle in credit exposure undertaken by enterprises and individuals. A grim outlook is…
LONDON | PAVE Platform on Wednesday announced the suspension of its plans for an ultra-fast marketplace focusing on Spanish, Portuguese and Latin American listed equities and ETFs. The Spanish equity market is one of the few major markets in Europe where deregulation and increased competition have yet to arrive and the Barcelona-based project’s aim was to bring in competition. The lack of capital resources, though, has forced it to admit defeat,…
LONDON | JP Morgan on Monday warned the investor community about Greece’s bailout negotiations being too dominant an influence on their immediate plans. The global asset management firm said that “Though investors will undoubtedly be focused on the negotiations over Greece’s second bailout this week, it may be worthwhile to step back and consider the broader outlook for equity markets for the year.” Since last October, according to JP Morgan…
MADRID | Pablo Fernández, Javier Aguirreamalloa, Luis Corres Avendaño | In the period between December 2001 and December 2011, returns on the IBEX 35 were at 4.3% while government 10-year bonds’ were at 5.13%. Among the 532 pension funds with 10-year history, only two funds exceeded the return on 10-year sovereign bonds and only three funds exceeded the 4% return. Even worse, 191 funds had negative average return (in December 2011 these funds had 1.7 million participants and assets of €6.246 billion). A reasonable enough question, then: is the favourable fiscal discrimination…
LONDON | The Investment Management Association sent Friday an unequivocal message to the European Commission: do mess with the risk rating agencies at your peril. In its written submission to the Treasury Select Committee Inquiry into credit rating agencies, the trade body for the UK’s £4 trillion asset management industry IMA defended the independent role of credit rating agencies. The IMA said they must be allowed to act free from political interference….
LONDON | For all the sovereign chin-ups the British prime minister David Cameron draws in every occasion he finds himself summoned to Brussels and Sarkozy’s financial transaction tax is mentioned, the savings gained in the name of the City of London would amount to just €8 billion. Mr Cameron and his euro sceptic troops, barricaded behind a loud sector of the British society too prone to vent their frustration over…
By Tania Suárez, in Madrid | Thanks to the current environment of improved trust and confidence levels, Spanish companies and banks have reopened the primary market. Santander was the first one, followed by Sabadell, BBVA, Banesto and Telefónica. Repsol and Ferrovial joined to this debt issuing, and it is expected that Pescanova will be the next one. Some experts see the European Central Bank’s open bar of liquidity, together with…
By Julia Pastor, in Madrid | Last week, Rajoy’s government passed a Royal Decree, which forced all the Spanish financial entities to provision a total amount of €50bn to cover the losses coming from the property boom effect. But banks had not yet calculated their corresponding piece of the cake. On Tuesday, the three biggest Spanish entities, Santander, BBVA and Caixabank, communicated to the supervisor body –the Spanish Securities Market Commission– the…
By Tania Suárez, in Madrid | Most Spanish financial analysts agree in their perception of Santander and BBVA as being favoured by the financial reform presented on Thursday by the minister of Economy Luis De Guindos. As a matter of fact, their quotes are gaining value. The reform has been received favourably, although some analysts are still cautious. On the one hand, Sabadell’s point out that “demand has increased, but…
LONDON | The London-based National Institute of Economic and Social Research on Friday put its baseline forecast for global growth on 3.5% for 2012. The NIESR gave next year a slightly higher growth rate probability of 4%. In both cases, the Institute assumes a downward revision of about 0.5 percentage point in each year compared to its last forecast. The NIESR warned that the financial instability resulting from the euro crisis, combined…