Just over half. Spain will use about 60 billion of the 100 provided for in the new aid package allocated by Europe in favor of the banking system of the Iberian country. This was announced by Madrid's Economy Minister, Luis de Guindos, in an interview with the International Herald Tribune.
In June, consulting firm Oliver Wyman calculated that Spanish banks have needed a recapitalization for at least 62 billion. And De Guindos believes that a not very distant figure will emerge from the final report on Spanish banks expected for mid-September.
The minister also expects that the ECB begins to buy Spanish public debt to ease the country's financial needs. But this it does not mean that Madrid will fall short of its deficit-cutting goals, which must be brought back to 3% by 2014, also through new austerity measures.
“The Spanish government agrees that the ECB's intervention on the secondary market will not stop the efforts to consolidate the budget and we must reassure the central institution that we will respect our commitments”, concluded De Guindos.
