The president of Junts, Carles Puigdemont, has spoken for the first time this Sunday on the BBVA OPA on Banco Sabadell. In a message on the social network X (former Twitter), he has doubted that the government, after the resolution last week of the national Commission of Markets and Competition (CNMC), goes to the transaction, and has justified that the counselor appointed at the end of last year by the party, Pere Soler, voted in favor of the approval of the transaction without casting a particular vote.
The CNMC gave the green light last Wednesday night to the BBVA OPA on Banco Sabadell. The yes was with a series of requirements, which immediately accepted the Basque entity. Among other issues, the prohibition of closing branches in rural areas, of modifying commercial conditions where there is not enough competition or extra shields for loans to SMEs. The surprise was Soler’s position, former director of the Mossos, who supported the resolution and finally did not cast a particular vote.
“The role of the counselor appointed at the proposal of Junts per Catalunya has been evilly confused. We will not defend the interests of a particular financial entity, because we have no interest in either of the two that are at stake. Neither of the two has helped the national interests of Catalonia, as is public and notorious,” said the expressor of the Generalitat. It admits a position found between Soler and that defended by the party, which expressed the general secretary, Jordi Turull, who claimed the Executive to stop the hostile OPA. Juns voices are especially critical of Soler’s decision.
Puigdemont has weighted the introduction at the last moment of an extra condition that gave greater protection to the credit of Catalan SMEs in front of those of the rest of Spain. That is, while the BBVA would only guarantee (to get ahead of the OPA) the medium and long -term debt of the entities that have at least 85% of the debt with the BBVA, the Sabadell or with the two, in the case of Catalonia and Balearicas this threshold is reduced to 50%. This issue was the one that unleashed the meeting and allowed approval without particular votes, as was the objective of the president of the CNMC, Cani Fernández, according to this newspaper.
For Puigdemont, this armor guarantees “coverage and protection above all other Spanish companies.” He has justified the resignation of the particular vote to the existence of a “especially serious problem of competition” in Catalonia, as well as the doubts that the government will finally stop the operation. After obtaining the authorization of the CNMC in a second phase, now the government has a month and a half to expand or reduce the conditions imposed by criteria of general interest.
In this sense, the Catalan politician has affirmed that the success of the OPA does not depend on a concrete vote of a counselor: “With a single vote or stop the OPA, there were no more arguments that the Spanish government already has to stop it where it can be seriously stopped.” “If the Spanish government, and if PSC and PSOE are consistent with what they say, the OPA is not viable,” he continued. He has also argued that the directors proposed by other parties have not issued private votes either.
At the moment, from the Executive they have been prudent, although in the previous months they have loaded against the operation. The Minister of Digital Transformation, Óscar López, said last Friday that the executive “will study in depth” the resolution of the CNMC. From the adding side they are more forceful. Vice President Yolanda Díaz also loaded after the jurisdiction decision against the operation and claimed to stop it.
