SPANISH BANKS ARE seeing a rapid increase in non-performing loans coming from the property sector, mortgage holders and small companies. Like banks everywhere, they are also finding the wholesale funding markets less than welcoming. But while the general collapse in confidence worldwide and the severity of Spain’s property crisis in particular has some investors spooked and on the lookout for any signs of trouble, the fundamentals of the picture, although by no means pretty, are not as bad as they might at first appear.
When the European Central Bank this September announced plans to increase the discount it applies to the unsecured bank bonds and asset bank securities that it accepts as collateral for loans, investors immediately singled out Spanish banks, particularly the mutual savings banks, the cajas, as those most likely to suffer.
The singling out of Spanish banks for their use of ECB loans, however, is unfair considering that they...
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