Garamendi On The Breakup Of BBVA And Sabadell

BBVA and Banco Sabadell announced earlier this Friday the breakdown of the negotiations started 11 days ago to merge the two entities . Investors have responded to the news with the massive sale of Sabadell shares, after learning that BBVA’s offer was lower than expected by the Catalan bank.

However, the economic world does not consider the operation lost: the president of the CEOE employer, Antonio Garamendi, trusts that the negotiations will return to good course: “There are courtships that are later resumed,” he said in an interview on TVE.

“It has surprised us all”, recognized the leader of the entrepreneurs. “We were entering the church and we had no wedding. But there are courtships that are later resumed ”, he added.

Garamendi recalled that for the economic world and financial institutions “these mergers are on the right track”, referring to the numerous calls from national and European institutions to reduce the overcapacity of the banking system to create more solid entities.

In October, the president of the European Central Bank, Christine Lagarde, insisted that “greater digitization and consolidation, national or cross-border, would strengthen the banks in the euro zone.”

Weeks before, after knowing the merger negotiations between Bankia and CaixaBank, the Governor of the Bank of Spain, Pablo Hernández de Cos, emphasized the need to reduce the number of entities to face the low profitability of the sector.

The CEOE chairman has avoided speculating on the reasons for the breakdown between Sabadell and BBVA, but he has recalled the importance that shareholders play in these merger processes.

“It seems that it has been due to a problem in the exchange and in the valuation of the shareholders. It is true that, regardless of management, the shareholders are in the bank and they have to be watched over ”.

But the most anticipated response of the day was that of the markets, which inflated the price of the two entities after the start of the negotiations. The Sabadell, which had seen its stock market value skyrocket by 32% in recent days, dropped 18% this Friday after the opening of the Ibex, a fall that moderated throughout the morning until falling around 13 %.

However, BBVA, which had recorded 19% in the same period , has responded well to the news of the suspension of the talks, gaining 2.6% on the Stock Market, ranking as the second fastest growing value in the world. Spanish index.

The Minister of Industry, Tourism and Trade, Reyes Maroto, has also spoken, who has indicated that “he could not say” if the breakdown of the talks between BBVA and Sabadell for their merger is “good or bad news”.

But he has insisted on the need for Spain to have a solvent financial system, unlike what happened in the 2008 crisis. “Anything that strengthens the financial system is good.

The more robust the financial system, the better it will be for Spain ”, he told RNE. In any case, Maroto has stressed that the Spanish financial system is “one of the best in the world” and has valued the response and “great responsibility” that banking has shown in the health crisis, by putting itself at the service of society and help save businesses and jobs.