Business View

Bolivian President Evo Morales faces another week of protests, the seventh row, with a national strike of 48 hours of drivers since Monday and a 72-hour general strike on Wednesday called by the Bolivian Workers Central (COB), among other conflicts.

Doctors and public health workers are on strike since March against a decree of Morales increasing their working hours, 6-8 hours, with road closures to Brazil and Argentina and clashes with police, and persist despite Morales announced Friday that it was suspending the measure.

Meanwhile, the Indians of the Amazon who oppose a road in the nature reserve Tipnis continue their march to La Paz to ask the president not to insist on that project.

The leader of the main carriers of La Paz, Gonzalo Thousands, confirmed today that 48-hour strike starting tomorrow will be reinforced with demonstrations and blockades of roads and avenues in this city and neighboring El Alto.

Drivers asked to mayor of La Paz, the center-Luis Revilla, exaliado Morales, to withdraw a bill that seeks to reorder the chaotic traffic in town and launches a public transport project drivers’ unions rejected because they fear remove sources of employment.

The COB, the largest trade union in the country, also Morales has called a general strike for Wednesday, Thursday and Friday to sue the populist president a salary increase above 8% who declared for this year.

This plant has led in recent weeks several strikes of 24 and 48 hours with partial monitoring, supported by teachers, doctors, miners and university, but has failed to stop the country’s economy because it does not have joined carriers, trade important and productive sectors.

The Executive Committee of the Bolivian University, which brings together principals, teachers and students of public universities, announced that they will begin an indefinite strike and street demonstrations Monday in search of more resources and support to physicians and the COB.

The leaders of the Indian Territory Isiboro Secure National Park (Tipnis) discussed on Monday if they resume their march in the town of Bermeo, where they rest from Thursday, after traveling over 50 miles in the last week shattered and flooded paths, the most of 550 projected to La Paz.

President of the Confederation of indigenous peoples of eastern Bolivia (CIDOB), Adolfo Chavez, said the media that in his next stop, San Ignacio de Moxos, where the majority of Morales supporters, there is an atmosphere of “racism and hate “mobilized against the natives.

Minister of Hydrocarbons and Energy of Bolivia, Juan Jose Sosa, said there is “a friendly” to negotiate compensation for Spain’s Red Electrica (REE) for the expropriation of its subsidiary Transportadora Energy (TDE), issued on May 1 by President Evo Morales.

Speaking to the official media hours before arrival in La Paz REE President Jose Folgado, the minister denied “categorically” that Bolivia has already set a figure on the value of TDE, as asserted by some means.

Revealed that Sosa had a cordial telephone conversation Folgado prior to their first appointment on Monday to negotiate compensation, for which the contract “a company that makes the assessment of what it means all assets and liabilities” of TDE.

“Once you do that, the company will give us a price that we have to sit at the table and only then, in that atmosphere of cordiality, to reach a settlement,” he added.

Spanish diplomatic commented that REE and Bolivia negotiate with “good will on both sides.”

“We categorically deny that there is an amount,” he said Sosa, explaining that when a few days ago, said “an amount almost close to 40 million dollars,” he spoke of what you paid Union Fenosa when TDE was privatized, but is now necessary to “update”.

Union Fenosa bought TDE in mid-1997 by $ 39 million and assumed liabilities in addition to the state for another 70 million shares before moving to REE.

Sosa added that the citizen is “cables and towers,” which, “as the years go by, they lose value the life they have.”

According to a statement of REE, the quote from Sosa and Folgado serve to “initiate negotiations for appropriate compensation and thus defend the interests of its shareholders.”

Apart from the visit of Folgado, next Wednesday will arrive in La Paz, Spanish Secretary of State for International Cooperation and for Latin America, Jesus Gracia, whose trip was scheduled before Morales decreed the expropriation by surprise, citing “insufficient” investment in TDE .

Grace will meet with several ministers, including Foreign Minister David Choquehuanca, and Minister of Planning, Viviana Caro, and other Bolivian authorities and Spanish businessmen, told a diplomatic sources.

Grace’s visit was scheduled weeks ago to review with the Bolivian government cooperation and investments in Spain, but now it is possible that the expropriation of TDE focus much of the talks, the sources added.

The Ministry of Economy has not yet defined the amount which plans to deliver by so called “hispabonos”, a mechanism that some have spent months demanding autonomy, especially Catalonia, which will harmonize emissions carried out by different public administrations.

According to a source, acknowledged the department is not currently set any figures as they are exploring all possibilities.

Since last March Economy works in different ways in order to prevent the various administrations have to pay more than the Treasury to place its debt.

This could mean in this context of difficult access to many regions and municipalities to capital markets, launching in the coming months of “hispabonos” joint issues of state debt and autonomy that are guaranteed the Treasury.

Sources Reuters recently warned that it will be difficult to see a release before the summer.

To implement this mechanism, the Economy Minister Luis de Guindos, this year announced the creation of an entity that begins to issue debt for all the regions in order to avoid the overhead of regional debt issues and liquidity problems.

In early February, De Guindos totaled 1,000 million euros for the additional pay each time autonomy issue debt with an interest greater than that paid by the state in their auctions through the Treasury.

As reported in today’s world, the Government launched from June emissions amounting to 30,000 million to address the maturity of the debt and to finance the deficit of autonomy that are not in a position to meet its commitments financial statements.

In total, the paper said, this year the autonomous communities have financing needs of 50,000 million, of which 35,000 correspond to maturing debt.

According to the Bank of Spain, Catalonia is the accumulating more debt, both in absolute terms (41.778 million euros) as a proportion of GDP (20.7%), and concentrated for 30% of public debt all autonomy.

In Catalonia it is Valencia, the second largest debt autonomy, 19.9% ​​of GDP, and Castilla-La Mancha, with 18%.

This situation is compounded by the announcement on Friday by the rating agency Standard and & Poor’s, which downgraded the rating of long-term debt of seven autonomous communities: Andalusia, Aragon, Madrid, Balearic Islands, Catalonia, Valencia, Canary Islands and Galicia, and placed its outlook as “negative.”

The risk measurement company, which also downgraded the rating of Navarra, Euskadi and Vizcaya, and the cities of Madrid and Barcelona, ​​placed the debt of the Balearic Islands and Catalonia “BBB-” a step in the junk bond.

The Spanish bank has lost 23,000 million euros of its stock market value during the first five months of the year, equivalent to the combined market capitalization CaixaBank, Banco Popular, Banco Sabadell and Bankia.

According to market data collected at the end of the first week of May, Banco Santander was the entity listed in the IBEX 35 that more value stock lost since late 2011.

In particular, its capitalization has increased from 50.289 million euros, to 42.479 million.

BBVA on the other hand, lost 7,321.5 million capitalization, to 25.431 million, while it did in CaixaBank 5.022 million.

In the case of Bankia, its stock market value has increased from 6,228.6 million euros at the end of last year, to 4.895 million in early May, which is 1.333 million less.

For its part, the entities that have lost less market value have been the Banco Popular and Banco Sabadell, with 798 and 223 million lower, respectively.

In the last week, the Spanish banking sector has been hard hit by the market as a result of the doubts that still raises his unfinished restructuring and cleaning up its balance sheet.

Mistrust that has been reflected in the downgrade has performed the Standard & Poor’s (S&P) on eleven financial institutions.

That punishment was the main selective Spanish Stock Exchange, the IBEX 35, to register a new annual minimum (6,831 points).

Nevertheless, the president of the European Central Bank (ECB), Mario Draghi, who was this week in Barcelona, ​​he was fully confident that Spain will take the necessary reforms that will restore confidence in the financial sector of the market.

Although he said that the ECB has not discussed in depth the financial reforms undertaken by Spain, was convinced going in the right direction.

“We have no doubt that action will be taken and will be with the speed and transparency, like other European countries, the markets are going to require,” said ECB President.

The last week and the seventh consecutive, the agency did not buy sovereign debt of countries with financial difficulties such as Spain, whose risk premium remains above 400 basis points.

One aspect, which also affects the Spanish banking sector, stressing the need for repeat ECB liquidity auctions for the sector.

Regarding the financial sector, also this week, Economy Minister Luis de Guindos, announced in the coming days there will be further mergers and acquisitions, while he was in favor of separate entities to their real estate assets of other businesses.

Foreigners invested 4.748 million euros in buying property in Spain in 2011, up 27% from the previous year, representing the largest payout made by this group since 2008, while that of the Spanish abroad fell 23.4%.

According to the Bank of Spain data collected, the Spanish foreign investment in real estate, which has increased for the second consecutive year, did not exceed EUR 4,000 million for three years and experienced a steep climb from the “boom” real estate.

With this rise, the consideration paid by foreigners in homes located in Spain closed last year at levels similar to those recorded in 2006, when investment totaled 4.716 million euros.

However, despite the money spent foreigners in Spanish property in 2011 far exceeded that was recorded in both 2009 and 2010, this amount remains far from the figures reached in 2007 or 2008, when exceeded the 5,300 million.

The increase in funding for foreign citizens to purchase homes in our country in contrast to the decline experienced by the Spanish investments in property outside of our borders in 2011, when the amount paid was 81% lower than that peak levels recorded in 2007.

Last year the Spanish 618 million invested in real estate abroad, representing a fall of 23.4% compared to 807 million a year earlier.

Unlike foreign investment in Spain, Spanish abroad has been reduced significantly since the glory years of real estate when even surpassed the 3,000 million euros.

Among the factors that have influenced the decline of Spanish investment include credit constraints and the reduced income of the Spanish and the unemployment rate, which in 2011 stood at 22.85% of the workforce, an exercise which first surpassed the 5 million unemployed, according to data from National Statistics Institute (INE).

To improve the vision of the Spanish property market, the previous government launched last year a “road show” for different countries to capture the interest of international investors.

Attracting the interest of foreign investors in the Spanish real estate sector is also a target for the president of the Builders Association of Promoters of Spain (APCE), Jose Manuel Galindo, who recently presented to the various authorities a package of measures to boost sales Tourist accommodation, some 250,000, in order to reduce the “stock”.

To achieve these homes sold, representing one third of the surplus, Galindo said that could get 50,000 million. A similar amount to the resources you have to provision the bank or new capital requirements that would need if a further deterioration of real estate assets.

The business models of Internet, network privacy, intellectual property and cyber, are some of the issues that government representatives, business and civil society discussed next week at the annual meeting of the Governance Forum Internet in Spain.

This forum Spanish born in 2008 to provide input to national and international debate on the development of internet and had its final impetus to the celebration in Spain EuroDIG European event two years ago.

Secretary of State for Telecommunications and the Information Society, Victor Calvo Sotelo, opened the second annual meeting of the Spanish Forum on the 10th, which will be distributed a document that both point of view coincide with national and international Internet Day on 17 May.

Sources of the organization highlighted the link between the meeting next week and held a year ago and the importance of involving administration, business and civil society to benefit the Internet ecosystem.

The forum is divided into seven discussion sessions in parallel chambers and can be followed through the network even with sign language translation.

The challenges and opportunities of Internet and the crisis of traditional business models will be present along with discussion of the new privacy regulations limiting so-called “cookies” and cloud computing, and its effect on the economy network.

Business and intellectual property, the right to internet access and the importance of so-called “critical resources” with exhibits on the debate about domains and the new internet protocol IPv6, will be part of this meeting.

Likewise, the ecosystem and the rules of international connections and interoperability of telecommunications is the process of change after 20 years of operation.

And as in such meetings, concern for children and their safety remains at the center of debates on this occasion will be directed toward adolescents and smart phones.

Sources recalled that the event is not open lectures but discussions that involve experts from all areas as Amadeu Abril, former ICANN director and current advisor to CORE Internet Council of Registrars, Jorge Calderon, CEO of e-UTA ; Andreu See, the Internet Society; Adsuara Borja, president of Red.es, Victor Domingo of the Association of Internet; Maialen Garmendia, director of EU Kids Online, or Nagore de los Rios, chief of the Basque Government Internet.