typicallyspanish.com

Spain Business
+ Larger Font | + Smaller Font
Spain Business Brief - Tuesday July 22 2008
By h.b. - Jul 22, 2008 - 12:46 PM
ALSO SEE : • Spain Business Brief - Friday August 29 2008 - Aug 29, 2008 - 2:57 PM
• Spain Business Brief - Wednesday August 27 2008 - Aug 27, 2008 - 7:31 PM

Minister for Tax and the Economy, Pedro Solbes - Photo EFE
enlarge photo

Public accounts in Spain move into the red for the first time in three years as the construction slowdown bites.
The public accounts have moved into the red for the first time in three years with a deficit of 4.68 billion € recorded for the month of June.
The cause of the problem, the ongoing slowdown in the construction sector and the ever increasing price of crude which has led to increasing costs for businesses. The deficit amounts to 0.42% of G.D.P. The government says that the measures they introduced earlier to help businesses and families have also had an effect on the deficit.
Between January and June this year state income fell by 4.8% to 66.93 billion € while costs increased by 10% to 71.62 billion €.

Minister for tax and the economy, Pedro Solbes, has said that the important thing is not the state deficit, but that there is no increase in the debt. Solbes said that a ‘slight deficit’ did not worry him. He said he wants to keep current levels of public debt and admitted that the surplus in Social Security can not compensate for the deficit in the public accounts.

British mobile phone operator Vodafone, has warned about a slowdown in demand in Spain, and the statement has led to a consequent fall in Telefónica shares as a result, down by more than 7% in morning trading..
The British company says that quarterly sales are up 19% thanks to emerging markets and that this has ‘compensated for the weakness’ of the Spanish market. Vodefone said that demand in Spain was down by 0.2% over the quarter.

Businesses in the tourist industry in Spain have warned that the crisis is now being noted in their sector. Exceltur has warned of a fall in domestic demand, and has said that the second quarter of the year shows ‘the first symptoms of the crisis which is affecting the economy’.

The Spanish social security system lost 17,500 foreign affiliates over the month of June according to data just released which shows a 0.8% fall in the number of affiliated foreigners with respect to the previous month. Nearly all the loss, 16,451, came from the construction industry.
There are now a total of 2,128,348 foreigners registered in the Spanish Social Security system, with nearly half of all of them in Cataluña and Madrid. Over the past year the number of non-EU foreign workers has fallen by 1.9%, while foreigners from other EU countries were up 10.1% in number.

One credit agency, Fitch, has issued a warning about how the Caja Madrid savings bank is exposed to the real estate and construction slowdown in Spain. The report thinks that bad debts to the bank have reached 3% with the money owed by Martinsa, with 23% of the credits from the bank awarded to construction or real estate companies.

Caja Mediterráneo is to launch on the stock market at the lower end of the expected launch price at 5.84 € a share. The lower price has been set despite the demand from institutional investors being 1.3 times the offer while demand from individual investors is over 2.2 times the offer. The shares start trading tomorrow.


 smartphone/pda/iphone |  email this article |  printer friendly page

 del.icio.us |  digg |  technorati |  yahoo | Stumble It!
Facebook | Reddit | Newsvine | Meneame | Wikio | Blink

ALSO SEE :
• Spain Business Brief - Friday August 29 2008 - Aug 29, 2008 - 2:57 PM
• Spain Business Brief - Wednesday August 27 2008 - Aug 27, 2008 - 7:31 PM
• Ferrovial told to sell three of its United Kingdom airports - Aug 20, 2008 - 7:22 PM
• Spain Business Brief - Tuesday August 19 2008 - Aug 19, 2008 - 7:02 PM
• Spain Business Brief - Monday August 18 2008 - Aug 18, 2008 - 4:50 PM
• Spanish Government announces new measures to fight the economic slowdown - Aug 15, 2008 - 2:00 PM
• Spain Business Brief - Monday August 4 2008 - Aug 4, 2008 - 7:05 PM
• Lloyds TSB has opened a new branch in Tenerife - Aug 4, 2008 - 6:46 PM
• Spain Business Brief - Friday August 1 2008 - Aug 1, 2008 - 1:36 PM
• Spain Business Brief - Thursday July 31 2008 - Jul 31, 2008 - 12:42 PM
• Spain Business Brief - Wednesday July 30 2008 - Jul 30, 2008 - 1:51 PM