Spain’s risk premium has fallen almost 5% with respect to Friday’s close after the socialist party’s decision to abstain and facilitate, finally, the formation of a government. So Mariano Rajoy will become President again after nearly 11 months in a caretaker role.
The PSOE “barons” rebellion against party leader Pedro Sanchez represents an internal power struggle. A national issue. Sanchez has been replaced by an interim executive committe headed by Javier Fernandez. Sanchez had a strategy worked out.
J.L.M. Campuzano (Spanish Banking Association) | The Bank of Spain has published the financial accounts for households and companies in the second quarter. The cash and deposits component was the highest, standing at 44% of total financial assets, representing a 1.3 percentage points rise in the period. This says a lot about their huge lack of confidence in the future.
The Industry Ministry is preparing new renewable energy auctions. It plans to invite tenders for between 3,000 and 4,000 technology neutral MW. That means auctions in which any kind of renewable energy can compete: wind, biomass, thermosolar, photovoltaic etc. This new boost for the renewables is happening to ensure Spain complies with the EU directive of fulfilling at least 20% of its total energy needs with renewables by 2020.
It’s undeniable that the latest information which has come out about the Bankia case reveals new areas of responsability. And in the front-line is the worst governor in the Bank of Spain’s history. The correspondence which the head of the Bankia inspectors’ team José Antonio Casaus sent to his superiors is definitive.
The latest figures from Spain’s airports manager AENA, reflecting the importance of the tourism industry, support the estimations given by the Secretary of State for Tourism, which point to a total of 74 million international tourists by end-2016. If the predictions are confirmed, there will be eight million more international tourists visiting Spain in 2016 compared to a year earlier, when there was a record number of 68 million. But can Spain’s tourism regions survive this widespread growth?
Up to what point is the lack of a government affecting Spain and its government? Spain’s Stock Market Regulator (the CNMV) now has no visible head. And the number of public sector jobs cannot be increased, nor AENA’s air fares. But perhaps this is due to other reasons which could have equally existed in a normal political situation.
Trump is not peculiar just to the US. There are Trumps in Austria, France, the UK and in every country. Except, surprise, surprise, in Spain!
The amount of government debt registered in the banks’ portfolios fell to 129.684 billion euros in August, over 5 billion euros below July levels. And it’s the lowest amount of public debt in their portfolios since July 2015.
ACS has recently agreed to sell its environmental services subsidiary Urbaser to Firion Investments, the investment fund participated by China Tianying, for between 2.212 and 2.463 billion euros. This operation will not only allow ACS to reduce its gearing, but it will also put Spain on the world map of Chinese investments.