Serious mistake”: slow integration, duplication of networks, branch closures and more unemployment Savings banks are addressing one of the most important restructuring processes in their history. However, the political tangle is causing many of the mergers to have a highly undesirable regional roots. Slow integration, duplication of networks and the closure of branches with the consequent increase in unemployment may be some of the negative consequences of these operations. According to high-level economic experts, to whom El Confidencial Digital has had access , geographical concentration does not seem to be the best solution for the restructuring process of the savings bank sector. One of the main drawbacks that these types of operations encounter is that resources are lost . The closure of branches is the biggest burden it can cause, with an increase in unemployment in those communities in the short term.
The human cost would be enormous, since the personnel of the central services would have to be added to the personnel laid off and retired early from the office network . There is a significant number of savings bank offices that do not provide profitability or adequate value to the business. If two entities with different NewZealand Phone Numbers 1 Million List regional areas of influence integrate, they have the possibility of closing a significant number of these loss-making or unprofitable offices, reducing fixed costs and increasing profitability . On the contrary, in the majority of regional mergers proposed, priority would be given to the closure of offices due to local coincidence over profitability . The number of branches that would have to be closed would be enormous, since the entities to be merged have opened offices in the same places where the other did. The same sources explain that these operations also encounter a significant duplication of networks , that is, synergies cannot be exploited . Furthermore, it must be taken into account that these are entities that have been competing in the same region.
The political factor is not alien to this situation. More so, when the scope of jurisdiction over savings banks falls, to a large extent, on the Governments of the Autonomous Communities. According to the experts consulted, the regional Executives have to banish the idea of having their own entity. “We must forget about political operations and focus on technical criteria ,” they clarify. Among the savings banks that have chosen to merge with entities from the same region are Caixa Nova and Caixa Galicia , which “have not exactly had a bed of roses in their integration,” according to the same sources. In the case of the Galician savings banks, 204 offices will be closed and nearly a thousand employees will be taken into early retirement. Also in Castilla y León, a merger has been carried out between savings banks from the same Community. This is the case of Caja España and Caja Duero .