Spanish Bankia’s good results irritate non rescued banks

Nobody in the banking sector questions the good governance of chairman Goirigolzarri’s team, but point out that most gains come from three not recurrent activities: i) financial operations, although they have been significantly reduced in the last six months y-o-y; ii) disinvestments in participated companies, and iii) offices and staff reduction (one third of the branches have closed).

Bankia managers highlighted its banking business revenue (net interest income and fee margin) went up by 12.6%, reaching €1.89bn. This piece of data must be carefully assessed as the bank lost a large amount of customers due to the crisis and at least some of the ordinary business could come back.

 “Results are particularly relevant after the restructuring. The bank managed to rise its income with a quite smaller office network  and attract customer’s deposits and funds worth €3.7bn,” said Goirigolzarri.

When will public aids be returned?

So far, Bankia has returned €1.3bn (out of €22.4bn, although the Bank of Spain always said about €10bn would have been enough) when the FROB – a public fund run by the Bank of Spain specialised in the restructuring of savings banks – sold 7.5% of its participation in the bank.

Spanish banking sector surreptitiously blaims Bankia for disloyal competition on the grounds of that unreturned bail-out. Some of the most critical voices come from the bankers who declared in international meetings (before the financial bailout) that Bankia was bankrupt and should be wound up. These remarks only got to harm Bankia’s public image and rise taxpayers’  contribution.