The Great Leap of Spanish Banks, 1987–2005: A Profit-Arithmetic (PA) Approach

Abstract

In the first chapter we raised the question of why the Spanish banking industry came to the forefront of the international competitive arena, and we undertook to provide an explanation. Our theory is that a common generic business model (albeit with some variations by banks) was adopted by the successful retail banks in Spain, and we believe that this may explain their emergence onto the world-banking stage.

The information for this section was mainly drawn from (Canals, 1990, 1996; Caruana, 2004; Dermine, 1999; European Commission, 2004; Gómez Escorial, 2004; Lamfalussy, 2001; Lucas, 2006; Lucas & Palacios, 2006; Palacios, 2004; Palacios, 2007; Palacios & Alvarez, 2003; Termes, 1991b, 1991a, 1995; Uriarte, 1994; Walter, 2004).

Acknowledgement must be expressed to Dr Juan Antonio Palacios who generously contributed to the drawing up of this chapter. Any value judgement is ours.