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| Mood in Iowa |
| Mitt Romney had a hard time selling his agenda to far right GOP supporters THE Iowa caucuses, in which a nation awaits the verdict of a handful of some of its least representative citizens, are not going to settle the race for the Republican nomination for president.
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| IT'S TIME TO SWITCH OFF |
| LET'S hear it for Volkswagen at the start of 2012. The German automaker has responded to demands from its works council by agreeing to stop the email server to its BlackBerry-using employees a half-hour after their shift ends... |
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Spanish banks need $65bn to shore up book
AP
MADRID SPAIN’S new conservative government expects the country’s banks to find up to euro50 billion ($65 billion) to shore up balance sheets weakened by exposure to a burst real estate bubble.
Economy Minister Luis de Guindos told The Financial Times in an interview published on Thursday this had to be done without posing a burden for public finances.
That indicates that the government will be loathe to put more money into cashstrapped banks.
He said most of the country’s banks could raise the money through their own earnings, while weaker lenders — such as savings banks called ‘cajas’ — could be absorbed in a new wave of consolidation.
The Bank of Spain says the country’s financial sector holds about euro176 billion ($228 billion)in bad loans or other toxic assets from the real estate sector.
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