The Spanish economy is reported to be growing at its quickest pace since 2007.
It was the fastest growing economy among the eurozone's 'big four' countries in August, making Spain the region’s “star performer”, according to Markit.
Spain’s Bankinter announced on Wednesday that it had reached an agreement with Barclays Bank to buy its business in Portugal for €100 million, representing a loss for Barclays of around €272 million.
Barclays Bank in Spain was sold last year to Caixa Bank for £633 million with 270 branches and more than 500,000 clients to be managed by the Spanish giant.
The Spanish Senate has agreed to establish a permanent base for some 2,200 Marines who can react swiftly to crises in Africa.
The base at Morón de la Frontera, about 60 kms south-east of Seville, already serves approximately 800 US rapid reaction troops who were deployed on a temporary basis following an attack in 2012 on a US mission in Benghazi, Libya.
Although collectively in agreement, each overseas BES depositor ripped off by Ricardo Salgado’s last-ditch attempt to save Grupo Espírito Santo, is to mount an individual court action.
Hundreds of overseas customers that ended up with their savings invested in risky commercial paper instead of BES deposits will go to court to demand the annulment of the investment and for their money back.
After a two month period of downtime, the SEF will be working with new Golden Visa rules as from Thursday 3rd September.
The Foreigners and Borders Service (SEF) suspended the Golden Visa programme on July 1st as there had been a distinct lack of joined up thinking when the old legal framework was upgraded.
The budget airline says that passenger numbers amounted to 10.4 million in August, another record for the company.
The August figures are 10% greater than they were in the same month last year and flights this August were reported to be 95% full.
The focus in Portugal’s justice system have been on the poor performance of the CITIUS computer programme which was meant to bit chunks from the backlog of cases.
Launched a year ago, and re-launched six weeks later after ‘teething troubles’ the new system seems to work in part but the caseload piling up at the country’s courts is more to do with a lack of people than the system, especially as many current cases have been filed under pending and others simply have disappeared.
The UK’s next £20 note is to be printed on plastic, according to the Bank of England which says the use of the polymer was favoured by 87% of the respondents in a 10-week consultation.
This is the third bank note which is to be converted to polymer. In December 2013, the Bank announced that the ne next £5 and £10 banknotes will be on the plastic.
