The evolution of lending in Spain
From January to July, the volume of new loans to companies reached €221 billion, an increase of 8.8% year-on-year.
Concurrently, new consumer credit (€20.1 billion) and housing-loans (€26.8 billion) saw gains of 21.8% and 15.8% year-on-year, respectively.
Private capital investment
In Spain, in the first half of 2018, investment in Private Equity and Venture Capital reached €3 billion (0.3% of GDP) in 334 investments, 0.5% more than in the first half of 2017 based on the estimates obtained by the Spanish Venture Capital & Private Equity Association (ASCRI).
By type of investor, international funds accounted for 77% of the investment volume in 214 investments, to a total of €2.3 billion (-2.1% year-on-year).
By investment size, the transactions of the middle market (between € 10m and € 100m) stand out, reaching a record high of €961.4m (+7.2% year-on-year).
By sectors, Energy (38%) leads the investment volume, followed by Consumer Products (14%) and Communications (13%).
Spain Manufacturing PMI
In August, Spain’s manufacturing PMI (leading indicator of the evolution of GDP) remained stable at 53 points and is projected to be 53.09 for September 2018.
Despite the great strides in production and order quantity, the tumbling business confidence conditions the future short-term evolution of the indicator.
Note: value> 50 economic expansion, value<50 economic contraction
Wages UK
Comparing the average weekly earnings (AWE) in the three months to July 2018 with the same period in 2017, real average weekly earnings (total pay adjusted for inflation) rose by 0.2%, and nominal AWE (total pay) grew by 2.6%.
Since June 2014, nominal wages have been steadily rising, owing to the rise in inflation and an unemployment rate of 4% that stands at the record lows of 1975.
The state of Business dynamics
The technological transformation is reshaping the business world and impacting the average survival chances of companies.
This trend is observed by the fact that in 2018, seven of the ten largest companies in the world by market capitalisation hail from the technology sector, while in 1980 and 1990, the Energy and Financial sectors were at the forefront, respectively.
In addition, this transformation is distinctly apparent in the US, where the market capitalisation of the technology sector alone is almost reaching $6 trillion, while in the euro area, all the listed companies combined account for $5 trillion. US tech giant Facebook attracts the spotlight, with 25,000 employees, presenting a greater market capitalisation than the entire Indian stock market (MSCI India1), a country with 1.35 billion people.
1 Concentrates 85% of Indian listed companies
Housing prices
New Zealand, Hong Kong, Canada and Sweden spearhead the increases in the housing prices with percentage changes of more than 30% in the last five years (Oxford Economics).
In terms of housing debt to GDP, Switzerland (121%), Australia (115%), New Zealand (89%), and Denmark (81%) stand out.
