Business News & Financial News

Spanish economy 6th April 2026

Employment rises, unemployment falls due to Holy Week, but 141,000 jobs lost on March 31st

Boosted by the start of Holy Week (Semana Santa), hiring grew in March compared to both February and March 2025, when the holiday period took place later in April. Consequently, unemployment fell by 22,934 people in March, a decrease of 0.94%. However, this required the signing of 1,311,000 contracts. Of these, nearly 577,000 were permanent contracts (contratos indefinidos). If they were truly permanent—and not just in name only—unemployment would be…

In Europe 30th March 2026

GfK consumer confidence index in Germany falls sharply in April to -28.0 points, compared to -24.8 in March

Singular Bank | In April, the GfK consumer confidence index in Germany fell significantly to -28.0 points (against -24.8 points in March), exceeding the decline projected by the consensus of analysts (-27.3). This development is explained by rising uncertainty and inflation expectations in the face of surging energy and other commodity prices linked to the conflict in the Middle East. The most notable change was the sharp rise in price…

In the World 26th March 2026

Final figure for Q4 2025 US labour costs: 4.4% year-on-year, compared with preliminary figure of 2.8%

Bankinter | Unit labour costs in Q4 2025 (final figure) rose by 4.4%, exceeding the expected 3.6% versus the preliminary 2.8% and compared with the previous drop of 1.8%. Productivity moderated to 1.8%, in line with expectations, from the preliminary 2.8% and 5.2% in Q3 2025. Analysis team’s view: cost pressures in the labour market increased in Q4 2025. It should be noted that Q4 2025 GDP (during which the…

“We need to approach negotiations with the U.S. on terms that are completely different from those currently being proposed”

Says Antonio Bonet, president of the Club of Spanish Exporters and Investors. He points out that “Europe has a single tariff applied by all member states, but the U.S. applies a tariff to each country, meaning it can decide that the tariff applied to Spanish black olives is higher than that for Italian olives, as it did at one point. So there is a part of the negotiation between Europe…

“Fifteen years ago, the European economy was larger than that of the U.S. Today, the U.S. economy is one and a half times that of Europe”

“It is a shame that we are able to mobilize economic resources for large-scale projects abroad, but not in our Spanish market”

In an interview with Consejeros magazine, Sacyr’s coordinating advisor, Elena Jiménez de Andrade, explains that now “We have great capacity to win projects, a capacity that until now contrasted with a series of financial limitations and balance sheet size. However, in this strategic cycle, we are going to eliminate those barriers. That is why we have set an ambitious goal for 2033: to triple the value of our assets. We…

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