Spain: No more budget cuts or tax increase this year

Spain’s economy minister has ruled out any Greek-style debt rescue and says there are no plans for new tax increases or budget cuts this year, in an interview published on Monday. Spain is at the centre of a fresh outbreak of eurozone sovereign debt concerns as investors fear Madrid will fail to meet deficit-cutting targets at at time when the economy is tipping into recession. Economy Minister Luis de Guindos said the country had no “Plan B” in case it needs to ask for an international rescue. “Spain is not going to ask for a rescue. No intervention will take place,” he said in an interview with the conservative daily El Mundo. “A country needs a rescue or an intervention when its sources of financing are cut off. That is to say, what happened in Greece, Portugal and Ireland. That is absolutely not the case in Spain,” De Guindos said. In the first three months of 2012, Spain’s Treasury had already raised 50 per cent of its financing needs for the year, he said, and the banks had enough liquidity to make interest payments for the next two years. “Spain has absolutely no financing problems or urgent needs.”