Finance Today

Bankia shares experienced a very strong rebound of 31.50% over two hours after the start of the session, breaking a run of ten consecutive sessions of cuts that had come to losing half its market capitalization.

A few minutes after the start of the day Bankia shares rose 9%, and 10.35 hours were changed to 1.87 euros, 31.50% more than the 1.42 that marked the close of the session precedent.

The surge enabled the institution to reduce its losses from earlier years at 48.75%, although since its IPO in July last year, has lost half its market capitalization.

Experts indicate that the rebound is a rebound after sharp falls of recent days, but also point to the calls for calm made ​​yesterday, Thursday, several members of the Government and the entity itself.

The fear of a massive withdrawal of funds meant that in some moments of yesterday’s session, the titles receded by 28%, although it moderated its collapse at the end and closed with a drop of 14.08%, to 1.42 euros per share.

Bankia President Jose Ignacio Goirigolzarri, acknowledged yesterday that the current situation is “extremely troubled” but said, the activity of the group is being these days “basically normal”.

“The evolution of deposits in the first fortnight of May” has substantially seasonal in nature, Bankia explained in a statement after meeting in recent days have gone over 1,000 million.

The rating agency Moody’s make this night a massive reduction of the note assigned to the Spanish banks, similar to the one held last Monday with the Italian banking.

The firm, according to financial sources, has begun to release to the next cut banks, as is required in these cases.

This reduction will take place on Monday after Moody’s downgraded from one to four steps the note of 26 Italian banks because of their vulnerability to the difficulties facing the eurozone.

Three months ago, in mid-February, the agency announced that it placed the rating on review of 114 European financial institutions in 16 countries, of which Italy and Spain were the most affected, with 24 and 21 entities respectively.

Moody’s justified then this action by the “negative impact and prolonged the crisis in the euro area”, combined with deteriorating credit quality and the challenges faced by banks and securities firms with significant activity in the capital market.

If Moody’s fulfilled his threat, the image of Spanish banks would be hit again, at a time when you’re having a hard punishment by plunging stock Bankia and the impact of the new financial reform.

This reform, which was approved on June 11, raises again the provisions to be made by the industry to consolidate their real estate assets in almost 30,000 million euros.

In this regard, Moody’s said this week that financial reform adopted by the Spanish Government and the nationalization of BFA were “positive” actions, but still left to institutions and creditors “vulnerable” if there are more problem loans.

He added that such actions confirmed the availability there to offer support to public institutions, although the amount and form of aid are “uncertain.”

“This burden will likely increase the already high public debt of Spain,” noted the agency, which expected to exceed 90 percent of GDP in 2014, almost triple the 36% in 2007.

On 30 April, Standard & Poor’s (S & P) downgraded after eleven Spanish financial institutions to do the same days earlier with the national sovereign.

Also another agency, Fitch cut its rating on February 13 Banco Santander, BBVA, CaixaBank and Bankia.

The German airline Air Berlin has set a target for this year to improve its operating result in more than 200 million euros through its efficiency improvement program “Shape & Size”, which has yielded benefits in the first quarter.

This was announced today at a press conference in Malaga the CEO of the airline for Spain and Portugal, Alvaro Middelmann, which has submitted the flight schedule for summer.

In the summer of 2012, the number of destinations that offer the company will remain stable compared with last summer.

Middelmann noted that Spain, with its traffic redistribution center of Palma de Mallorca, “will continue in 2012 a very important and strategic market” for Air Berlin.

He stressed that in the past nine years, “no other carrier has made an offer as wide from Mallorca,” both by the number of flights and the diversity of destinations, said today Air Berlin said in a statement.

From Palma de Mallorca, the company offers, along with its Austrian partner airline NIKI, more than 500 flights a week to 44 cities in Europe, thereby strengthening its position as leader of the largest resort airport in Europe, according Middelmann.

Through German centers in Berlin and Düsseldorf can be reached from Mallorca, specified, 22 other destinations in Europe and around the world, so the total number of destinations available from Air Berlin will be 66 in 18 countries .

From Malaga airport, the firm along with NIKI fly to 40 destinations, three domestic, 17 Germans, 16 the rest of Europe and 4 international.

Middelmann indicated that increased international destinations linked to the Malaga airport in cooperation with Etihad Airways is one of the most important news for summer 2012.

The Japanese electronics group Toshiba announced today that it has stopped producing TVs in Japan as part of its strategy to revive this sector deficit, which in the past fiscal year 2011 it reported losses of some 488 million euros.

The group has left the local manufacture of televisions in the arrest of the last factory in Japan where produced, the Fukaya, located in the province of Saitama, north of Tokyo, said a source from Toshiba to Kyodo.

The manufacturer of the Regza range of televisions faced last year to a sharp decline in sales of appliances in Japan a full turn in the summer, the transition to digital terrestrial television.

The group also faces stiff competition from companies such as South Korea’s LG and Samsung, the latter a world leader in sales of flat TVs, which is coupled to a strong yen decline in profits outside.

It is expected that the company continues to produce televisions at its plants in Indonesia, China, Poland and Egypt.

Fukaya’s factory, which began operations in 1965, will remain as the basis for development, planning and servicing, while workers will be relocated to other centers of Toshiba.

Last fiscal 2011 the company won 73,700 million yen (720 million euros), 46.5% less than in 2010, while sales fell 4.6% to 6.1 trillion yen (about 59,600 million).

Toshiba attributed the slowdown to the appreciation of the yen, the impact of the earthquake in March last year in Japan and autumn floods in Thailand as well as the weakening of European and U.S. markets.

The drop in TV sales, competition and the appreciation of the yen have also affected other Japanese giants like Sony Electronics or Panasonic, who recognized the need to restructure an industry that last fiscal year they reported significant losses.

Hitachi also plans to leave in late September its domestic production of flat screen televisions to take it to other parts of Asia such as China or Taiwan, to cut costs.

Portugal Telecom (PT) earned a net profit of 56.5 million euros in the first quarter of this year, thanks mainly to its operations in Brazil.

The results are much lower than the same period in 2011, 129.7 million, although they benefited from extraordinary transactions of sale of live operator Telefonica and the entry of PT in another Brazilian company, Oi.

Consolidated revenues also rose dramatically to 1,716 million euros, almost double that in the period of 2011, financial adjustments in Brazil, even discounting the amount outstanding, representing a 2.7 less than in the first quarter of last year.

The results of the former monopoly telecommunications Luso handily beat analysts’ forecasts, although its gross income in Portugal fell by 5.2% (37 million),

According to information released today by the Commission on Securities Market (CMVM) Lisbon, PT increased its EBITDA (earnings before tax, amortization and interest) by 59.9 percent to 571.7 million euros .

Amid the severe economic crisis in Portugal, PT achieved their higher incomes, 60 percent in international markets, focusing on Brazil, which also correspond 227.3 million of EBITDA.

Gross profit of the operator arising in other markets, especially in Africa, amounted to 36.8 million, 37.3 percent more than in the first quarter of 2011.

The operator recorded investments of 259 million euros (120 in Brazil and 115 in Portugal) dedicated mainly to the expansion of telephone networks of third generation in the South American nation and fourth in their domestic market.

Its subsidiary Lusa Mobile, TMN, kept the customer base of 7.4 million, a slight increase of 0.6 percent, while its cable television operator Portugal, Meo, won 26.9% of subscribers , to 1.1 million.

Also fixed the subsidiary achieved a significant increase in customers, 11.9%, bringing its total to 1.14 million.

The Catalan economy has entered recession technically falling 0.1% in the first quarter and contracted for two consecutive quarters, said today the Department of Economics of the Generalitat.

In the first quarter of 2012, GDP has fallen by 0.1% over the previous quarter, which fell 0.5%.

In annual terms, gross domestic product Catalan has had a fall of 0.4%.

According to the Generalitat, the Catalan economy decline has slowed due to the strong performance of merchandise exports and tourism have neutralized the effect of contraction of domestic demand.

The construction, which adds fifteen quarters of falls, continue to obstruct the Catalan economy has recorded the same activity as in 2002.

Agriculture grew by 0.1% in the first quarter, the industry fell 0.4%, the drop in construction stood at 5.1% and services grew by 0.4%.

The export growth has benefited the industry, after stopping the last quarter of 2011, has managed to reduce its decline and stood at a minus 0.4% during the first months of 2012.

This improvement is mainly due to positive growth of transport equipment, machinery and mechanical equipment and food, beverages and snuff.

The gross value added service sector has increased by 0.4% yoy, but was two tenths lower than the previous quarter because of declining trade activity subsector.

The number of tourists from the EU and the rest of the world has grown by 9.9% over the same period last year, tourism spending has increased by 17.6%.

The Spanish Minister of Economy, Luis de Guindos, today held meetings with investors in London to explain the reforms under way in Spain and in particular the recent banking reform, told the delegation.

At its meetings in the City (City of London), British investors showed “great interest” on the reforms undertaken in Spain and the crisis in the eurozone, according to these sources.

De Guindos traveled to London from Brussels, where he participated the last two days at the Eurogroup meeting, in full escalation of the risk premium in Spain and political instability in Greece, which has questioned the membership of that country to the area euro.

As he did in London today, the Spanish Minister presented to the members of the Eurogroup finance reform approved last Friday by the Council of Ministers, which led to the nationalization of Bankia.

He also spoke of the fiscal consolidation and structural reforms and future planned in Spain and plans to control spending of the autonomous communities.

Spain has used the European Central Bank (ECB) to give greater credibility to the independent assessment of the credit portfolio of Spanish banks in two months and expects to complete its analysis on bank balance sheets.

The Eurogroup supported the last financial reform in Spain but asked the government of Mariano Rajoy to accelerate the external analysis of the assets of banks, a task that will look at a large loan portfolio of Spanish banks, in excess of three billion euros and approaches 300% of Spanish GDP.

“There is nothing to hide, believe that the reform we are doing is a reform that clarifies, introduces transparency and clarity in the balance”, he said in Brussels De Guindos, who declined to be necessary to request assistance from the European rescue fund to recapitalize banks.

Experts and analysts rule out that Spain has to ask for help from the EU and be subject to a bailout despite high levels found in the risk premium and Spanish bond yields and ten years since the country is financed without problems in the debt market.

The fall in German bond yields to ten years, whose differential with Spanish the same period measures the country risk premium, the risk has now shot to record highs in Spain although the Spanish bond yield is still far from the level Critical 7%, above which the bailouts were approved for Greece, Portugal and Ireland.

After starting the session beyond 6.5%, the profitability of Spanish bond was reduced to ten years in early afternoon trading to 6.2%, while the yield Germanic began the day at the record low of 1, 43% to increase slightly to 1.48%.

The fall of Germanic bond is the result of investors harbor doubts about any European emissions than German, doubts that have allowed the Treasury to finance that country even negative rates, so investors prefer to give in return to profitability the safety of their money back.

Fluctuations experienced in today’s secondary market would cause the risk premium reached Spain in the early stages of the session its highest level since the creation of the euro, 507 basis points, and then reduced to 477.

Although analysts are reluctant to fix a threshold at which the intervention of a country is inevitable, highlight the national bond yields and ten years as the reference to be taken into account before the risk premium, which depends not only the ease or difficulty of a State to finance but of Germanic bond oscillations.

Citi strategist Jose Luis Martinez Campuzano Spain ensures that the default risk of a country and the consequent inflow of capital and management of the EU not so much the level at which place the risk premium or the profitability of your bond ten years as the speed is reached.

A year ago, the risk premium in Spain was 250 stitches, almost half that today, while the return on ten-year bond stood at 5.2%, representing an increase of 20%, while the German bond has halved in twelve months, from 3.1% to score in May 2011.

The problem, says Campuzano, are the country’s difficulties in accessing finance, difficulties that Spain does not suffer despite the higher interest that the Treasury has had to pay the past debt issues.