Savers withdraw cash, shoppers stockpile supplies
"I came here and invested in Catalonia. Now I am worried about my money and my investments." Juan Jose Gonzalez, pensioner
SPAIN: Savers have withdrawn hundreds of thousands of euros from banks and shoppers are stockpiling food amid growing panic that Catalonia is about to declare independence.
The manager of a Barcelona branch of Caixabank, the Catalan lender that is Spain’s third biggest bank, said that customers had withdrawn €400,000 (NZ$664,000) in one day last week. ‘‘Normally any branch only holds up to €200,000 in cash, we had to request extra so these people could get all their money,’’ said the manager. ‘‘They were putting it in Spanish banks. There was a real panic. Mine is only a small branch. Imagine what it was like in bigger branches.’’
Fear that the Catalan government is poised to announce independence from Spain today has led several companies to move their headquarters from Barcelona. As investor panic spread, Caixabank decided to take its legal headquarters out of the wealthy northeastern region.
Juan Jose Gonzalez, 70, a pensioner who moved to Barcelona 10 years ago and bought a flat, has withdrawn all his money from Caixabank and invested it in Banco Santander, which is based in Madrid.
‘‘I came here and invested in Catalonia. Now I am worried about my money and my investments,’’ he said.
‘‘What do they think will happen to Catalonia if they leave Spain? We do not want to be in this limbo. At least 35.5 per cent of Catalan exports go to Spain. There will be a massive boycott by the Spanish of Catalan products if they leave.’’
Shoppers have been buying double their normal amount of weekly groceries and stocking up on bottled water, according to local supermarkets, amid fears that civil unrest could erupt if Catalonia announces secession.
Madrid could respond by imposing direct rule on Catalonia and enforce this using the army.
Bethany Gutierrez, 39, who was born in Barcelona, said: ‘‘I am buying extra of everything. I am also getting lots of bottles of water. If things go really badly, there could be riots. I know lots of people like me doing the same.’’
As the exodus of companies leaving Catalonia gathered pace, there were reports that Carles Puigdemont, the Catalan leader, may be trying to buy time to delay declaring independence. He held a meeting with Juan Jose Bruguera, president of the Circulo de Economia, a business group, who told Puigdemont that secession would be a ‘‘bomb’’ for the Catalan economy.
Sources within the business lobby said Puigdemont appeared to be searching for ways to delay declaring independence to restore business confidence.
Banco Sabadell is to move its headquarters from Barcelona to Alicante, in southeast Spain. Gas Natural Fenosa, an energy company, and Planeta, one of Spain’s biggest publishing companies, have announced that they are to move from the Catalan capital to Madrid.
The board of Abertis, an infrastructure group, is to meet today and is expected to leave. Grupo Agbar, a water company; Arquia Banca, a lender; Service Point, a services firm; Proclinic, a dental company; Oryzon Genomics, a biochemical group; and Criteria Caixa, a banking group, have all transferred their legal headquarters to other parts of Spain.
Some British businesses have cancelled investments in Spain in protest at the deployment of riot police to break up an illegal referendum last Sunday, when hundreds were injured.
Xavier Adam, 40, managing director of AMC Network, a finance group based in London, said a planned €300 million investment in Spanish real estate projects would not go ahead.
He wrote to Carlos Bastarreche, Spain’s ambassador to the UK, saying: ‘‘As an international investor of some repute and an expert on the Spanish economy, I write to say how appalled I am by the way your country has behaved in Catalonia.’’ - The Times