Measured from the close of May 7 - the day Bankia’s president Rodrigo Rato announced his resignation - through noon of Thursday the 18, when its shares hit a low of €1.17, Bankia shed no less than 48 percent of its value. Adding to this the 40 percent lost since the July 2011 initial public offering through early May (this perfectly in line with the average euro zone bank over the period, by the way) and the hoards of retail depositors cajoled into parting with their savings in order to subscribe to the IPO by their local bank managers, we’re looking at just shy of a 70-point loss in a bit over eight months. It wasn’t intended to turn out that way. When Banco Financiero y de Ahorros (BFA) … [Read more...] about Bankia: A tale of confusion, conflict and unnecessary haggling
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The market tears up Zapatero’s social contract
“My government’s ambition is to make this an innovative, creative, entrepreneurial country while upholding the social welfare state… I think we should learn the lesson of the Great Depression: when an economy enters a deep recession, the only way we can come out of it is from a big push from the public sector.” José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero uttered these words less than a year ago. At the time, with Spain mired in recession, critics could argue with his ideological stance, but nobody could doubt his convictions. However, the prime minister’s announcement on May 12 of a broad and radical raft of austerity measures has seen him perform the biggest U-turn of his six years in government … [Read more...] about The market tears up Zapatero’s social contract