Deep dive into Spain’s private sector
Fecha: mayo 2024
SEFO, Spanish and International Economic & Financial Outlook, V. 13 N.º 3 (May 2024)
Index
An analysis of EU trade and foreign direct investment flows reveals a relative decline in the EU’s competitive position, notably with respect to the US and China, with the EU now a major net exporter of capital to invest in companies located in other countries. Greater participation by member states in the single market has played a mitigating role but is insufficient to offset the broader weakness unless supported with strategies for revitalising investments within the bloc.
Since its deregulation 50 years ago, the Spanish banking sector has been shaped by significant structural transformation as a result of the need to adapt to an ever-changing environment, to which it has demonstrated resilience and flexibility. On top of profitability pressures, the management of risks under the growing regulatory push to increase solvency, on the one hand, and technological challenges, on the other, remain the most important issues facing the Spanish banks in the years to come.
Bank deposits have been shown to play a role in shaping monetary policy and access to credit. Crucially, firms entering the tightening cycle relying on credit from lenders with higher duration gaps could be significantly less likely to obtain funding as tightening starts, with this likelihood becoming increasingly lower for banks experiencing deposit outflows.
The interest rate risk deriving from the mismatch between asset and liability maturities and/or repricing, which had spread across the US banking system one year ago, has now hit the central banks – with some reporting zero profit, or even losses in 2023. While this phenomenon is not expected to have implications for financial markets stability, there may be important implications related to fiscal policy and monetary policy settings going forward.
Whereas in 2022, corporate income registered significant growth, nearly revisiting pre-pandemic levels, in 2023, it was household income that was more dynamic. By comparison with 2019, in nominal terms, the income gap between the non-financial corporate (NFC) and household sectors widened, revealing an incomplete recovery in the corporate segment compared to solid growth in household income.
The rate tightening embarked on by the ECB in mid-2022 has had a negative impact on debt sustainability for both Spanish corporations and households; however, the ultra-low rate environment until 2022, together with ongoing private sector deleveraging, offset the spike in interest rates such that debt service costs did not increase in 2023. As a result, last year, debt service for both Spanish corporations and households, at 34.7% of gross operating surplus and 5.6% of gross disposable income, respectively, remained low relative to international standards.
The majority of the 3.2 million economically active enterprises in Spain as of 1 January 2023 are pursuing organic growth, in which their headcount increases in line with their number of years in business. As there appears to be a divide between the sectors that are home to a higher number of active firms and the sectors with a higher incidence of startups, there could be scope for creating value by fostering collaboration between these two spheres – Spain’s legacy businesses and the startup ecosystem.
Significant changes in the dynamics of the supply and demand for credit are disproportionately increasing the financing needs of Spanish SMEs and microenterprises, while increasing constraints for access to credit, thus notably widening their financing gap. Public financial instruments, both at the national and regional level, could serve as a key economic policy tool for lending financial support to the productive sector at a time of heightened uncertainty.
An analysis of the stock of fixed capital of Spain’s non-financial corporations from 2011 to 2023 reveals the persistence of a post-pandemic time lag in the recovery of corporate investment. A recovery in investment will require a recovery in returns to pre-pandemic levels and a drop in the user cost of capital as inflation eases, rebalancing the relative costs of capital and labour in the process.