MADRID | By Julia Pastor | Spanish entities credit portfolio amounted €746 bn at the beginning of the year, a 5.99% fall against same month last year, while holding deposits at €687 bn, which meant a yearly growth of 0.53%. March figures suggested a new reduction of credit lending to SMEs and families. As long as banks do not have their balances adjusted by 2015 after the ECB’s stress tests, credit and deposits will not tip towards loans.
SEVILLE | By Ana Fuentes | When it comes to innovation and data management the U.S. is the absolute global leader. But Brussels wants to make up for many years of sitting on its hands: the cake is too yummy to allow Amazon or Google to eat it all. Fiware, a tech platform born from a public-private partnership, aims to finance an open ecosystem for SMEs to develop innovative projects. The budget for the best ideas is 100 million euros, way less than the American big firms are investing. But Spanish entrepreneurs eager to leave the crisis mood behind insist it’s worth to give it a try.
MADRID | By Tania Suárez | Spanish SMEs have an alternative financing channel: the new Alternative Market of Fixed-Income (MARF for its Spanish initials) for SMEs became a reality on Monday. The government is trying to avoid dependence on bank credit.
MADRID | By JP Marin Arrese | These days, the EU institutions remain on standby mode till Angela Merkel steps in. The ECB is no exception. It is switched on but not actually working. Europe is waiting for the new German government to set the new agenda’s content and rhythm. Only then, substantive decisions could be taken.
MADRID | By José S. Mendoza at Capitalmadrid | Spain retailers sales rate fell by 2% last July compared to year ago. It’s already been 37 months – plus 3 years – of consecutive annual declines for them, according to data from the National Institute of Statistics. The Federation of autonomous workers ATA warns that the retail sector is experiencing a really difficult situation, with a constant and continuous fall of sales and job losses.
MADRID | By Julia Pastor | Small and medium size companies are the most vulnerable side of the European economy, but also the most powerful weapon to get out of the crisis. Germany will develop a €10 billion credit plan to move peripheral countries SMEs for their own export engine works.
MADRID | The newly created Alternative Fixed Income Market (MARFI, in its Spanish initials) for small and medium size enterprises (SME), that the government wants to have ready, could mobilize around 1 billion euros (1.3 billion dollars) within its first year of existence, says Axesor. The company, specialized in information and credit risk management, adds that the yield could stand somewhere between 6 and 10%.
LONDON | If more than 99% of all European businesses are, in fact, small businesses that shape the true back-bone of the European economy, European governments are clearly missing the chance to generate at least a few millions of new jobs.
LONDON | The sterling on Tuesday was mostly unmoved by the light controversy between some of the top ratings agencies regarding the UK’s triple A qualification on its government debt issuance. That is the highest grade, only to be found over the so-called core European countries. A day had barely passed after Standard & Poor’s said the British AAA was solid, when Moody’s noted that an increasingly weak economy poses…
LONDON | Even before the office for national statistics released its estimates of a UK economy in continued slow-motion deterioration, 84 percent of small and medium size companies’ decision makers said they were concerned about the British economic climate, with 38% being very concerned. A new SME Risk Index from global insurer Zurich published Friday showed that the majority in the sector do not feel confident that the economic situation will improve in…