At stake

Spain’s savings banks have long been some of its most powerful kingmakers, especially in takeover battles such as Endesa’s. This is thanks to the huge stakes that these cajas, as they are known, hold in so many major local firms. So the fact that La Caixa, Spain’s biggest caja, is about to put most of its E20bn of industrial holdings in a single portfolio and float it on the stock market could mark a major change in Spanish capitalism, especially if the other cajas follow suit. However, the chan...