By Julia Pastor, in Madrid | Update Mariano Rajoy, elected by an overall majority on November 20, made his investiture speech on Monday. The investiture debate in the Spanish parliament has been held on Tuesday, and after its closing in the afternoon, Mr Rajoy has been officially sworn in as the new Spain’s president. The announce of austerity measures raised yesterday great expectations, since from the election day and in spite of the…
The Governing Council of the European Central Bank (ECB) decided last week on additional enhanced credit support measures to support bank lending and liquidity in the euro area. In particular, the Governing Council proposed to conduct two longer-term refinancing operations (LTROs) with a maturity of 36 months and the option of early repayment after one year. Among other measures, the central bank also accorded to reduce the reserve ratio, which is…
MADRID | The Spanish investment website Consenso del Mercado reported about the Spanish Treasury’s positive results in placing its bonds on Tuesday. Spain’s public Treasury sold over €4.941 billion in bonds at 12 and 18 months, more than expectations marked, at considerably lower rates than in previous auctions. This means that Spain has passed the first market test after the agreements that were reached last week in Brussels. With this sale, the…
By Julia Pastor, in Madrid | Ratings agency S&P’s threat of downgrading the euro zone and the EFSF has fallen like a ton of bricks among leaders and European institutions. Santander analysts believe, however, that it has also been accepted with a certain degree of realism: “The German Minister of finance, Schäuble, commented that the warning is the best incentive to promote a solution to the crisis and regain the confidence…
MADRID | The Spanish press on Wednesday published reports of the newly elected Spanish President Mariano Rajoy’s trip to Marseille, where he will meet with US Secretary of the Treasury Timothy Geithner and then, later on, jointly with French president Nicolas Sarkozy and German Chancellor Angela Merkel. Rajoy will also have the opportunity to meet with the president of the European Commission Jose Manuel Durao Barroso, and with the Polish…
Mariano Aldama of the Royal Bank of Scotland and responsible for capital market origination for financial institutions in Spain and Portugal, has given an interview to the business daily Cinco Días in which he admits that, despite the critical situation of Spain because of excessive financing costs, it is possible to restore market confidence. We offer an excerpt of the interview. How long can the banking system resist without financing itself? The rejection in the markets can not last much longer but first there are pieces of the puzzle that…