Comments by if only I´d left in the other direction

Agreed with J Rawlins, what we need to see is a change of culture in Spain, which probably has to be pushed from outside (Brussels)

I also believe Brussels should conduct a kind of post-mortem into Zapatero´s Spain. PSOE, his political party, is very important to Spain and it needs to say Sorry to the Spanish people and widen it´s base away from organised labour and the parochial provincial academic types that enter politics for life. Being able to speak English is an obvious qualification going forward. As well as some at the top of PSOE who have a business background, preferably someone who has started a business and gone on to success...

Seseña is now where near being sold out, it´s still a ghost town.

That´s not quite the case, I have 1st hand experience of it, it´s maybe different to the US but it does exist.

I´ve also heard from people at the sharp end of this (in local banks/caja´s) that the worse problem they face is the mortgages that were given to largely immigrants from Latin America, who have lost their employment in Spain and jyst headed home. You might have read there´s an association of Equatorian immigrants to Spain who have formed to fight this whole issue from their point of view, and I´m not saying they are entirely wrong, they too were fed the manta that house prices in Spain never go down!

I think this "idea" about not being able to walk away from a Spanish mortgage and leave the bank in the S**t is on a par with some of the other old chestnut that did the rounds.. Remember Spanish banks had been forced by the Bank of Spain to provision against bad loss´s and this would protect them come what may. Or that the bank holds Tito´s house as security against your mortgage when unfortnately Tito´s house was appraised at a € value that also put it in the realms of fantasy land and therefore quite useless as a real guarantee.

We´re in a mess as you can plainly see by visiting Idealista.com or Fotocasa.com and analysing what people hope to sell their houses for versus what the market will likely pay in rental income

Warming to P. Sanz,
Yea, let´s bring into the light the sex trade & drugs trade and get them paying tax; also why not scrap the spped limit too on Madrid´s basically empty private motorway network and we can create a kind of holy trinity of vices!
Also there´s all the talk about the US billionaire and his mega casino project for Madrid - although personally I think that´s destined to be another Warner Bros. theme park disaster.

Not warming so much to Computense..
I think you´re kind of missing the point. It´s all about Spain being in a straight jacket with a big German gorilla with which it can´t match; plus the as yet largely hidden & undiscovered financial black hole that is Spanish housing, ergo all the fanciful offers on fotocasa.com and idelaista.com etc.
I think we´re just beginning in Spain to accept that many of these millions of people on "el paro" were involved in building, financing, designing etc etc. All these stupid pisos that litter every corner of Spain. In years gone bye, the press and the PSOE govt. too denied even that this sector was much bigger than the European avaerage, something of a sick joke looking back on it!

Wishing Mariano Rajoy lots of luck..

Echoing some of the previous comments that he speeds up and improves the legal system especially, when it comes to white collar kind of crime done by people sitting on the top of the pyramid.

That he reforms the labour market, and perhaps he could just copy line for line the laws of say Singapore or Hong Kong, and hey presto instant kudos around the world.

And he should send out some roving sleuths all over Latin America offering any small or medium sized enterprise a "free" piso in Madrid, and encourage them to come to the city and use it as a beach-head to establish their business´s in Europe.

Finally, and my heart sinks when I read it in the press today, he should change corporate culture in Spain, so that institutions like BBVA don´t try and change their articles to allow Sr. Gonzalez to hold on to power until he is 75. Less posing and preening from Spanish head honchos, give the next generation a chance, and champion the internationalisation of Spanish corporate culture. With some more women at the top too!

A sure fire recipe for Spanish success...

JasonArgonaut,

Please read Wolfgang Munchau in the FT today, he hits the nail on the head. It´s all about house prices and the over supply in the market.

Spain´s corporate success´s don´t add up to a pile of beans against that back-drop, and anyway the big ones all seem to be headed for the exit right now.

Even if you are a foreigner living in Spain you have a right to an opinion, especially when you pay tax here!

I´m afraid Enrique is blinded by his patriotism, and he summed up the limitations this imposes on his mind when he said "So if you don´t like Spain you are free to emigrate to another nation".

The thing is Turrican is that "they" can only get away with it because there is some substance behind their allegations!

I believe Spain will stop being referred to as the next fall guy only when the mess that is a consequence of the housing boom has been cleaned-up!

Anyone who cares to take a look at idealist.com or photocasa.com can see that the chasm between what individuals & the banks (who are also large holders of residential property in Spain) are offering for Sale is multiple times removed from what others are looking for in rental income for the same properties.
Plus very high unemployment and little interest from overseas paints a gloomy picture

Chuchi1,

Cheer Up... With people like you on the scene one can´t help have a smile on one´s face!

I wonder what percentage of Spanish families have a joint income of more than 40.000 euros? Never heard of milleuristas! Those that aspire to making 1000 euros per month - they´re the lucky ones with jobs! And anyway, how does that make constructing yet more houses a good idea when there are thousands upon thousands of empty one. Ship them out to Seseña or dozens of other slightly smaller versions all over the place.

Spain may well be 7th in the World as you say, but I´d guess it´s cumulative over years, with a bias to decisions made in the 1980´s to manufacture automobiles..

The people who write as you do don´t like criticism.. Especialy when it comes from a foreigner.. That´s more the story here. And pride is leading Spain into a trainwreck style economy.

Chuchi1,

I can only speak for myself. This was an article that supposed to be about UK banking. That´s what I was interested in undestanding!

As for putting down Spain... It´s more about living in Spain as a foreigner, reading the newspapers & watching tv. and wanting to scream! Watching a friend drowning would be my best analogy. And what sets me off most is either the continual drip drip drip of corrupt politicians, most of whom never seem to quite get to trial.. Or, like today, with El Economista reporting "El Ayuntamiento de Madrid aprobará el Plan de Reforma Interior del Area de Prolongación de la Castellana, la denominada 'Operación Chamartín'" or yesterday in El Mundo "Boom de la Vivienda Protegida - 12,234 viviendas en Getafe..."
Who makes these decisions? Why build more houses & offices when there are 10´s of thousands of empty new ones all over Madrid. Surely let the prices of what lie empty fall sufficiently to let the demand that there is swallow it up. Is Madrid really going to grow it´s populations any more? The million or so who largely came to build houses and clean those same houses are on the dole, part of the 20%. There´s insufficient commerce in Madrid, and practically zero interest from outside investors to set-up in Madrid. I could go on... Sadly there´s no debate here. The politicans are either too corrupt or too dumb or too involved in "ladrillo" to be able to smell the coffee.

Written in sadness

@ One Spanish Pig,

I kind of agree with you on some of what you say. The UK is the US´s lapdog or whatever.. But you´ve got to sell yourself in this world, and there´s no shame in that. Here´s to being a lapdog for the Chinese and Indians too : you can still excerpt a litte influence now and again, even if it´s only peeing on the Masters leg from time ti time..

Agreed better if there was a European rating agency. But if there was, I think Europe´s Number One idiot Sr. Zapatero would want to try and influence how it worked and who was in charge! He would probably put one of his wise men Mousieur Deloir or ex Spanish President Felipe Gonzalez in the hotseat. Wow....

I don´t think there is an Anglo conspiracy at work here. Just some logic that takes a while sometimes to surface.
The Euro just doesn´t fit all these economies. The politicians did a bad job. It´s an aspiration, but they should have done it in a much slower gear over a period of decades. Spain, and it hurts me to say it, is one of the big longterm losers because of it.

@ One Spanish Pig,

Some of it´s th ability to keep trashing Sterling until trade picks-up. Some of it´s not having how ever many hundreds of thousands of unsold new houses. Some of it´s not having 20% unemployment. Some of it is higher wages and more of those jobs in the private sector. Some of it are large UK based/founded Co.´s other than banks Some of it are the many foreign Co.´s who choose the UK as their base for Europe... Some of it is no urgent need to overhall pension, labour relations etc. Some of it is a relative lack of corruption and efficient rule of law. Some of it is comparitively few politicians. Some of it is a long history of innovation and research.

It´s quite a long list really!

For the neutral (someone who is neither Spanish nor living/doing business in Spain) I think you can learn more from the Spanish language blogs that by reading The Economist. The Economist in large parts only seems to attract the patriotic brigade who will defend all things Spanish to the hilt. Doesn´t really add anything to the debate....

I think the health of Spanish financial insitutions is rather secondary to what´s happening in the housing market in Spain. If that can be fixed, then there´s little to worry about, particularly with references to the Cajas and smaller banks.
Sadly on this point the news is as confused as ever, even The Bank of Spain reporting via Bloomberg at the very end of 2010 that Spain had an unsold housing stock of between 700,000 and 1.1 million units. That 400,000 spread is in itself equivalent to something like all the housing in the city of Cologne and suburbs!

The truth will out as they say. And I think it will come when interest rates rise. Spain will suffer most.

@ Spaniard fbm

Questioning many Spaniards about the veracity of particularly Santander and BBVA but the Spanish financial system in general has become like asking if the Pope is a Catholic. Logic and reason got thrown out the window a long time ago and it´s become like a tribal chant.

Enrique,

Are you available for story telling to young children over the Xmas period?

Enrique,

This is when you lose many of us with 1st hand experience of Spain. Your patriotism is blinding you to reality, a little bit like ZP last night in his CNBC interview..

I´m afraid on this basis Spain´s day of reckoning is merely being postponed, which will make it all the more acute when it does arrive.

Swallow your collective pride, burst the property bubble completely, wear a hair shirt for a few years, and then get on with it...

Enrique,

I concur with your sentiments entirely, but that´s the past, and you can´t live there!

And Spain has got huge problems today, and seemingly few options as things are to find a prosperous future, certainly if you´re one of the 20% unemployed.. And with a simpleton (ZP)at the wheel too

Sorry
David

Here´s a link to the photo (courtesy of El Pais) of Zapatero with his invitees.
http://www.elpais.com/especial/reunion-zapatero-empresarios/

Please note abundant grey hair - which I take as an indicator of advancing years (sorry to Sanmartinian if you´re in their camp - no personal offence taken I hope). Also note almost complete lack of a female invitees, no one with a non Spanish surname much less likely born outside of Spain.

And then you have to wonder, how many of them have actually started a business from scratch? With their own money.. Or invented something new? It´s not some corporations started with State help decades ago. Or with Contracts from the State... Or something that runs in the family over generations.

Imagine President Obama in a similar type of meeting. He can sit down next to Americans and non Americans alike, in charge of large US based and foreign Co.´s who have created & invented. Who maybe are from a different race or were born in India or Mexico or... And likely as not there will be a few women around the table too.
Some of Spain´s European neighbouring countries more, or slighly less perhaps, demonstrate the same kind of vitality too...

It´s in everyones best interest if Spain´s housing bubble pops big time and the sooner the better. And Zapatero leaves the stage, and goes back to the Circus, as soon as possible.

Spain doesn´t have to start over again - but the next time there is some expansion - that there will be a greater variety of types of people doing a greater variety of things... Everyone would benefit, and Spain would finally truly live up to it´s undoubted talents.

@ Sanmartinian,

That´s not beyond the bounds of possibility!

I guess by lunchtime we will all feel better that Zapatero and the now 37 have this problem licked..