CaixBank: cross-border mergers face political difficulties

The chairman of CaixaBank, Jordi Gual, considered today that large cross-border mergers, for which the European authorities have shown great interest, face "enormous "political difficulties that need to be solved.

Frankfurt (Germany), Nov. 7 (EFE) .- The chairman of CaixaBank, Jordi Gual, said today that large cross-border mergers, for which the authorities have shown great interest European, face "enormous political difficulties" that need to be resolved.

Gual told EFE, after intervening in the second forum on banking supervision organized by the Bank European Central Bank (BCE), that CaixaBank experienced these difficulties in the case of the BPI (Portuguese Investment Bank).

"It has not been easy to buy BPI and until we have a system of more harmonized resolution, deposit insurance system, an active common risk for all Europe, large banking border transactions will not arrive and do not think it It's good that they arrived because we do not have an integrated market as the American is, "Gual said.

He added that in the US" there are banks that are all over Europe because it is only one politically and in the euro area we are 19 countries. decision is policy ".

The chairman of CaixaBank also noted that" you can not make a technical decision "cross-border mergers of banks.

" In Europe we have advanced a lot with technical decisions and the population does not like it because they have not voted. State, "said Gual.

He also considered that" mergers within countries is also a way to reduce the excess capacity of the system, which is something that the ECB has said several times, there are too many entities, too many offices. "

Although the chairman of CaixaBank is not so clear that there is so much excess, but that" the overlaps are higher within countries. "

" Spain has already made a great effort to reduce capacity by around 35 or 40%. Gual.

Regarding Germany, he said that "there is a very peculiar system, with savings banks and many public banks, which are not normally governed by the same criteria and it costs more to evaluate excess capacity. "