Financial flows and balance sheets of households and non-financial corporations in 2018

The Financial Accounts of the Spanish Economy (FASE) show that in 2018 households received positive net bank financing for the first time since 2011, mainly due to the increase in consumer credit and other lending, while their saving ratio continued to fall, to a new historical low. These developments were, however, compatible with a further reduction in household bank debt (to 59% of GDP, down 26 percentage points (pp) from its peak in 2010). At the same time, the gross financial wealth of households edged down, for the first time since 2012, mainly as a result of the fall in value of their holdings of financial instruments caused by the global financial market tensions in the latter months of 2018. As regards firms, although their total borrowing in consolidated terms was positive in 2018, their debt ratio fell to 75% of GDP at the end of the year (down 43 pp from its 2010 peak). The market value of the equity securities of firms fell by 4.1% in 2018. This fall, the first since 2008, was a consequence of moderate fund raising and especially of the decline in value of these liabilities, largely owing to the drop in stock market indices at the end of 2018 (this drop was, however, reversed in the first few months of 2019).