Spain defends its banking system
14:46, 4 October 2012
BEIJING. October 4. KAZINFORM Spain's Economy Minister, Luis de Guindos, has said a "bad bank", set up to allow lenders to offload bad investments, will be 55 percent privately owned.
According to Xinhuanet, speaking on Wednesday in Parliament, De Guindos said the stake in the bad bank would be offered to private sector companies hoping to turn around the bad investments and eventually make a profit.
De Guindos defended Spain's banks, saying an audit last week showed 70 percent of the financial sector is in a condition to handle a severely stressed situation.
The audit said seven banks hit hardest by the 2008 collapse of the property market will need an additional nearly 60 billion euros to survive a severe downturn.
The minister said Spain will tap a "vastly lower" amount from its 100 billion euro rescue loan.