Pablo Hernández de Cos: The challenges to the Spanish banking industry

Address by Mr Pablo Hernández de Cos, Governor of the Bank of Spain, at the Conference on banking, profitability and monetary normalisation, organized by University of Deusto, KPMG and El Correo, Bilbao, 5 October 2018.

The views expressed in this speech are those of the speaker and not the view of the BIS.

Central bank speech  | 
11 October 2018

Good morning. Let me first thank the organisers for their kind invitation to me to participate in this Deusto University event. It is a pleasure to be here with you today and to share some thoughts on the Banco España's view of the main challenges currently facing the Spanish banking industry.

As is well known, credit institutions were greatly affected by the last crisis. This was manifest in a strong rise in impaired assets, including both non-performing loans and real estate foreclosures, and in a significant fall-off in profitability, which even turned negative in 2012.