CRISIS



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Rajoy to Spain’s banking sector: “be transparent and merge”

MADRID | In his the first interview granted to Spanish media as Prime Minister of the Spanish government and after a number of weeks of silence (which has been heavily criticised by the press), Mariano Rajoy explained to new agency Efe some details of his political and economic project for the country. Among many aspects, he spoke of the restructuring of the financial sector for which he announced a re-organisation plan,…


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Barclays: “US vulnerable to markets’ attacks like the EU”

A note from Barclays Spain: “The Fed’s double mandate (inflation and employment) has probably contributed to the present crisis. Greenspan, faced with the necessity to improve the anemic growth, but probably to a greater extent faced with the pressure exerted by Congress and American society to create employment, (which still has not picked up despite the GDP’s increase) maintained interest rates low for too long, promoting together with other factors…



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De Guindos confirms that Spain will start the year in recession

MADRID | All the Spanish press reported the new Minister of Economy, Luis de Guindos’ statements when he confirmed on Tuesday what everyone already knew: that Spain would go into recession in 2012. According to his predictions, the first trimester of 2012 will register a negative growth, just like the last trimester of this year in which the GDP will decrease by between 0.2% and 0.3%. During the inauguration of…


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Shopping in Europe

NEW YORK | While European companies and banks try to forget this annus horribilis, some US financial firms are rubbing their hands: under pressure from regulators, Europeans will have to shed up to $3 trillion in assets over the next 18 months, according to Morgan Stanley. Market dislocation on this side of the Atlantic means also a great occasion for American companies to go shopping. This month the German Commerzbank…


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Fearful Europeans

Only the Danes are significantly more positive than the rest of Europeans. More than four of five Danes look hopefully into the future. As an explanation, a British-American Tobacco’s foundation, which recently published a research on Europeans’ attitudes, notes that the Danes increasingly think about personal quality of life instead of the economic standard of living when referring to the term ‘future’. For them, this includes, for example, emancipation, work-life…



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Madrid’s financial City: “EU pacts inspire willing optimism, but were not yet there”

By Julia Pastor, in Madrid | The Spanish financial analysts received the news that arrived from Brussels with a certain degree of optimism, not without disappointment, but recognising that the pacts that were achieved imply a step forward. Banco Sabadell experts give an outline summary of the conclusions reached at the meeting. “Starting with the fact that expectations were low and that the market’s sentiment was negative, the final balance is…