RSS
Spain Business Brief - Friday June 19 2009
larger | smaller
By h.b. - Jun 19, 2009 - 2:02 PM
EFE
The Madrid regional parliament has approved the new Ley de Cajas which affects savings banks in the region. The law, which is seen as part of the political control of the Caja Madrid savings bank, was passed with the votes of the Partido Popular and IU with 76 votes in favour and with 39 votes against from the Socialists. Those in favour of the new law say it guarantees judicial security.
Banco Santander has meanwhile approved an increase in capital of 1 billion € to finance their second dividend of the year which the board proposes to pay in shares. Chairman, Emilio Botín, has said he expects the bank to repeat both the profit and dividend achieved last year. Profit is expected to come in at 8.87 billion €.
Meanwhile the Bank of Spain has said that it rules out any possible collapse of the financial system, and that it considers the ‘worst has already past’.
Deputy Governor, Javier Aríztegui, called however for the banks and savings banks which need help with liquidity to carry out a restructuring, but he sidestepped any talk of forcing them to merge.
Another company which considers it has side-stepped the crisis is the Prisa media group, although they are now looking for new investing partners to move forward with a new model of technological development.
Chairman of the group which contains El País and Digital Plus, Ignacio Polanco, gave a message of calm to a meeting of shareholders.
‘We cannot be happy because the profitability of Prisa has reduced, but we can say that we are one of the few media groups which has sidestepped the negative effects of the crisis to present favourable results’.
Yamaha Motor España has presented an ERE application to temporarily lay off 184 of its workers at its plant in Barcelona. The average lay-off time has been set at 35 days per worker. It comes as the company reports a 28% fall in demand for motorbikes and mopeds in Spain. A statement from the Japanese company says the plan will allow it to adjust production and resources to the current demand.
The recession is hitting small shopkeepers hard in Spain where the sector is seeing sales some 15% down on a year ago and 128,000 jobs have already been lost.
Secretary General of the Spanish Trade Confederation, Miguel Ángel Fraile, said he was ‘roundly opposed’ to any possible increase in VAT/IVA, saying he thought the Government should be lowering taxes, not increasing them.
‘If we earn less, logic says that we should also pay less to Hacienda’, he said.
An argument has broken out in the PP meanwhile over the suggestion that they favour reduced taxes, even for yacht owners. Senator Judith Albert noted the idea presented by the party which has called for the elimination of registration taxes on recreational boats.
|
|
Click here for related stories |
mobile
|
email this article
|
printer friendly page
del.icio.us
|
digg
|
technorati
|
yahoo
|
Stumble It!
Facebook
|
Reddit
|
Newsvine
|
Meneame
|
Wikio
Blink
|
Google
|
Fresqui
|
MSN reporters
|
Live Spaces
My Space
|
Fark
|
Mixx
|
Twitter
Spain Business
Readers' comments:
Please keep to the subject. Opinions published here are of our visitors, not the Typically Spanish team. Comments which go against Spanish laws or which are libellous are not allowed. We reserve the right to delete any comment we wish. Placing a comment indicates you have read our terms and conditions and privacy policy .
Por favor, céntrate en el tema. Son las opiniones de los internautas, y no las de Typically Spanish. No está permitido verter comentarios contrarios a las leyes españolas o injuriantes. Reservado el derecho a eliminar los comentarios que consideremos fuera de tema. Escribir un comentario indica que has leído nuestros condiciones de uso y politica de privacidad .
