A freelance journalist, Mark wrote for Spear's magazine and the New Statesman in London before relocating to Spain. In addition to his weekly finance column and features for SUR in English, he also writes on Spanish politics for The Spectator.
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Opinion
No one asked for him, but Pedro Sánchez is the new Spanish prime minister. And since he outsted Mariano Rajoy in last Friday's political coup, the 46-year-old has wasted no time in assembling his new cabinet, naming EU high-flyer Nadia Calvino as Spa
Opinion
People don't like their politicians to be comfortable. They don't like [them] to have expenses and they don't like [them] being paid. They'd rather [they] lived in a f***ig cave." These colourfully expressed truths come from the Alastair Campbell-b
Opinion
Over the last few months, the popularity of the Spanish government has been steadily declining, but the most recent test of voters' intentions puts it in third place for the first time. According to a survey conducted by Metroscopia for El País, cent
LifeStyle
I've never been much of a spa person. I get bored very quickly in baths and could always think of a million things I'd rather spend the money on (beer being one of them). But the prospect of visiting a Beer Spa was irresistible, especially one in my
Opinion
It was reputedly Einstein who defined insanity as doing the same thing repeatedly and expecting different results each time - a definition that seems appropriate when applied to the more radical separatists in Catalonia. For the second time since D
Opinion
Partly because of a slight slowdown in Q1 growth, the Spanish government announced this week that the pace of Spain's GDP expansion is going to decrease over the next three years. Year-on-year, the country's economy expanded by 2.9% in the first thre
Opinion
According to the Spanish Civil Guard, even more public money was unlawfully spent on last October's Catalonian independence referendum (1-O) than was at first estimated. Investigators now put the total amount at EUR1.9 million - an increase of EUR300,000
Opinion
Who exactly paid for the independence referendum held in Catalonia on October 1st last year? This was the question raised by Spain's budget minister Cristóbal Montoro in an interview with the Spanish daily El Mundo on Monday. The Popular Party politi
Opinion
Is there no end to the woes of Spain's ruling Popular Party (PP)? It has emerged that Cristina Cifuentes, leader of the conservative PP in Madrid, obtained a master's degree from Rey Juan Carlos University (URCJ) under questionable circumstances. All
Opinion
EU-mad Romano Escolano, Spain's incoming economy minister, is already showing where his priorities lie. Even though his predecessor, Luis de Guindos, does not officially take up his position as vice president of the European Central Bank (ECB) until
Opinion
Spain is throwing its toys out of the pram about Gibraltar again. This Monday, a deal between the EU and the UK concerning the terms of a 21-month transition period was almost agreed upon. But at the time of writing (Thursday morning) the deal has no
Opinion
The precarious status of Mariano Rajoy's minority government was highlighted once again this week. In yet another attempt to pass the 2018 budget, the Spanish prime minister promised his opponents in congress that this year's spending plan could incl
Opinion
This week saw Spain have another crack at regaining some power in Gibraltar, thus making the latest contribution to an argument it's been having with Britain since the early 18th century. Spanish foreign minister Alfonso Dastis told the UK's Financia
Opinion
The inevitable has finally occurred. On Monday, after months of machinations within the EU's most obscure institutions, Spain's economy minister Luis de Guindos was named as the next Vice President of the European Central Bank (ECB). The perpetually
Opinion
Mariano Rajoy's days as prime minister of Spain are, or should be, numbered. That is the conclusion to be drawn from the latest Metroscopia poll for the Spanish daily El País, which revealed that 85% of Spaniards want the Galician old-timer to give s
Opinion
Spain's economy minister is going to be preoccupied over the next few months - but not with the Spanish economy. Or at least not principally with the Spanish economy. After months of elliptical statements and hints, Luis de Guindos finally announced
Opinion
It's hardly been the most auspicious start to 2018. In what is surely a sign of things to come, Mariano Rajoy's minority government is once again having trouble securing approval for this year's budget. If this sounds all-too familiar, it's because l
Opinion
Don't break open the champagne just yet. This week, the credit ratings agency Fitch promoted Spain up one level to its A grade, praising what it called the country's "strong, relatively broad-based, economic recovery". The upward revision constitutes
Opinion
It has long been the Popular Party's (PP) mantra that it is the only competent steward of the Spanish economy, having overseen the country's steady recovery from recession over the last few years (or so it claims). But since last October, that messag
Opinion
Just how concerned is the Spanish government about the potential cost of the Catalonia crisis to the rest of the country? One week it seems to be very worried indeed, yet the next it appears to shrug off the dangers, and nowhere is this more evident
Opinion
Estimates for the potential cost to Spain of the Catalonia crisis are like those of Brexit for the UK: in both cases, the figures are constantly changing, depending on what side of the argument they're coming from. The latest forecast regarding the C
Opinion
With every year that passes, Spain's macroeconomic expansion appears increasingly indifferent to the activities of Spanish politicians. Evidence for this was again provided by the Bank of Spain this week, when it announced that Spain's Q4 2017 GDP ex
Opinion
I'm writing this column on Thursday, as Catalans vote for their next government in an election called for by Mariano Rajoy last month. In normal circumstances, it would be a tricky piece to write, because I know that these words will be published tom
Opinion
Exiled Catalan president Carles Puigdemont, it would seem, is not very commercially-minded. During October, the number of new businesses opening in Catalonia dropped by 14.3% compared to the same month last year. Existing companies are fleeing too: i
Opinion
This week saw the Basque Country's president Iñigo Urkullu defending the region's special financial deal with Madrid. Known as the Cupo Vasco and hardwired into Spain's 1978 Constitution, this pact enables the northern region to collect its own taxes
LifeStyle
Andalusian writer Elvira Navarro is under no illusions about the stylistic influence possessed by translators. "A translated book," she tells me by email in Spanish, "has a co-author: the translator. Their job is to find the best version of [the writ
LifeStyle
Even though I finished reading this novel very late at night, I couldn't sleep for hours afterwards. The final, perplexing chapter had led me to question everything that preceded it; I wanted to trust the protagonist Elisa, but could I? Who was reall
Opinion
Does the Spanish economy minister know something we don't? After a meeting with Accenture Strategy and El Economista newspaper this week, Luis de Guindos was asked who he reckons is likely to take up the soon-to-be-vacant position of Vice President o
Opinion
The potential economic cost of the Catalonia issue has been discussed exhaustively since the illegal independence referendum on October 1st. The more constructive task now is trying to work out whether there is a solution to the economic aspect of th
LifeStyle
Maria de Visitaçao is a newly-arrived prostitute in a Spanish brothel.By night, she deals with the "strenuous thrusts" of the smugglers who have taken over the contraband industry in nearby Fronteira, a town just over the border in Portugal; but by d
Opinion
The Bank of Spain has released its first official estimates on the economic impact of the Catalonia crisis, and they're just as vague as you'd expect. The bank predicts that the recent turmoil seen in the north-eastern region of Spain could shave off
LifeStyle
By his own admission, the narrator of this brilliant and dark novel is a "c***sucker". He is at the very bottom of a three-layered hierarchy that constitutes the world of work in Spain: at the top are the "Buddhas", who barely work but are unsackable
Opinion
After the turmoil of the last month, it was refreshing to hear some entirely predictable news this week. Spain's National Institute of Statistics (INE) confirmed that the country's third-quarter growth was at 0.8%, slightly down from the 0.9% posted
LifeStyle
On a bleak dawn in January 1939, three months before the end of Spain's devastating Civil War, a group of fifty Nationalist prisoners are lined up in the clearing of a forest near Collell monastery in northern Catalonia. Among them is Rafael Sanchez
Opinion
No one, absolutely no one, knows what's going to happen next in the Catalonia saga. That is the only real conclusion to be drawn from the last few weeks, during which the Spanish media has been entirely consumed with the possibility of the region's p
LifeStyle
The elegant and wealthy city of San Sebastián sits on Spain's wild Basque coastline, twenty miles south west of the French border. It is a hugely popular holiday destination - particularly among Andalusians, who love its temperate climate and its gre
Opinion
Partly because it fears an economic hit from the Catalonian independence issue, the Spanish government has lowered its GDP growth forecast for Spain in 2018 from 2.6% to 2.3%. But it has not yet altered its projection of 3% growth for this year, even
Opinion
The economic reaction to Catalonia's illegal independence referendum two weeks ago has been somewhat confused - a fact mainly owed to the general chaos and unpredictability unleashed on October 1st. On Tuesday evening - much to the dismay of some
Opinion
The markets are already registering the fallout from Sunday's shambolic and violent independence referendum in Catalonia. Shortly before 11am on Wednesday, Spain's benchmark index, the Ibex 35, dropped below 10,000 points for the first time since the
Opinion
It remains a mystery how Catalonia could split from Spain, even if a "yes" vote is returned in this Sunday's incendiary referendum. Even so, the region's business community is becoming nervous about possible effects of the protracted battle being fou
Opinion
The battle for Catalonian independence between Madrid and Barcelona is now being fought on two fronts. First there is the economic front, on which both sides are armed with figures apparently showing that secession would be a disaster for Catalonia,
Opinion
Annual predictions for Spain's GDP growth are changed several times a year by the Spanish government and various national and international economic bodies. That much we already know. But what we learnt this week was that the Spanish economy's perfor
Opinion
On Wednesday evening, following a tense 11-hour debate, the Catalonian parliament voted by 72 to 52 in favour of an independence referendum on 1 October. An explosion of secessionist fervour followed, with regional president Carles Puigdemont leading
Opinion
The markets aren't taking the prospect of Catalonian secession seriously. That is the conclusion we can draw from this week's announcement by credit ratings agency DBRS that it is "very unlikely" it will change its rating for Spain if Catalans vote f
Opinion
Last Thursday afternoon, Barcelona and the Catalonian coastal town of Cambrils were hit by terrorist vehicle attacks that killed 15 people and injured over 100, fifteen of them gravely. These tragic events leave us to speculate about the combined imp
Opinion
This week saw Mariano Rajoy issue his latest warning to the increasingly aggressive separatists in Catalonia. On Wednesday, he asked the regional government - headed by the fervent secessionist Carles Puigdemont - to act with "common sense" and to "i
Opinion
Spain appears to be on a roll. Second quarter economic growth, it was confirmed last Friday, was 0.9% of GDP, meaning that the Spanish economy has now returned to pre-crisis health. Unemployment is at its lowest level (17.1%) since 2009, with jobless
Opinion
Predictions for the growth rate of the Spanish economy this year have almost reached the magic number of 3.2% - the rate at which it expanded in 2016. On Tuesday, the IMF announced that the country's economic expansion will be 3.1% of GDP in 2017, th
Opinion
Regardless of the economic and social problems Spain has endured over recent years, it has not lost its status as one of the world's tourism heavyweights. Every year, huge numbers of visitors from around the world come here seeking limitless sun, che
Opinion
This week saw the latest development in Spain's ongoing campaign for greater integration within the EU - or so a cynic could say. On Wednesday, it was announced that the EU has been awarded Spain's Princess of Asturias 2017 Concord Prize for maintain
National
The Spanish economy minister has apparently turned into the EU's biggest fan. In an interview with the UK's Financial Times this week, Luis de Guindos said that the only way for the EU to survive in a post-Trump-Brexit world was to come closer togeth
LifeStyle
When the English writer and Hispanophile Laurie Lee stepped off the boat and onto the harbour of Algeciras in November 1951, pandemonium greeted him. It was 15 years since Lee had been in Spain, but the seafront of this chaotic, dirty fishing village
National
One of the Popular Party's key messages to the Spanish electorate is that it is the only party fit to run the economy. This week, further proof of the PP's economic competence was offered - so Mariano Rajoy would say, anyway - by Bank of Spain govern
Opinion
The state of Spain's GDP has been much on the mind of Luis de Guindos this week. On Wednesday, during a debate in which the country's absurdly delayed 2017 budget was finally approved, the Spanish economy minister told congress that GDP growth might
National
Pedro Sánchez is back. After eight months as a political outcast, the former Socialist leader once again took control of his party on Sunday, defeating establishment favourite Susana Diaz - head of the PSOE in Andalucía - in doing so. Some comment
National
Spain's recently unveiled proposals for deeper integration within the eurozone highlight one of the 19-member bloc's fundamental problems - namely, that its most wealthy countries resent subsidising the poorer ones. In a paper submitted to the EU in
Opinion
Though there must have been a sigh of relief in the Popular Party headquarters last Thursday, when Mariano Rajoy's 2017 budget narrowly survived defeat in a parliamentary vote, the Spanish prime minister would be wrong to think he thereby passed some
Opinion
For the Spanish economists I wrote about here last week, the phrase "official statistics" is little more than a synonym for "invented statistics" when it applies to Spain's economy. They will therefore be deeply sceptical of the latest "official" ind
Opinion
In its most recent tweak to global growth forecasts, the IMF has hiked Spain's projected GDP expansion for 2017 to 2.6%, up from 2.3% in January. Although very slight, the increase is an indication that the body's economists see no immediate threat t
Opinion
Economically speaking, it seems that Spain is firmly back on track. According to official statistics, the country's GDP will very soon rise above pre-crisis levels; in other words, Spain's economy is back to where it was in 2008, before the recession
Opinion
Mariano Rajoy has finally presented 2017's budget, over half a year late. The political deadlock of 2016 is largely responsible for this delay, as is the fact that Rajoy now only commands a minority government. As a reflection of the prime minister's
National
The mini-scandal generated by Eurogroup president Jeroen Dijsselbloem's claim that southern European countries squander EU funds on drinking and chasing women will soon be forgotten. Ignition of Article 50 this week is, after all, a slightly more imp
Opinion
It doesn't happen often, but I recently agreed with something Mariano Rajoy said. Last Friday, the unflappable Spanish prime minister told reporters in Madrid that regarding the soon-to-commence process of the UK's withdrawal from the EU, "There is n
Opinion
At a conference organised by El País and Sabadell Bank on Monday, post-Brexit relations between Spain and the UK were discussed by a panel from Spanish media, business and politics. Spain, said some of these experts, can't afford to display hostility
Opinion
The outcome of one of Spain's highest-profile criminal trials is now known: Rodrigo Rato, former deputy prime minister and ex-head of the International Monetary Fund, is going to prison for four-and-a-half years after being found guilty of overseeing
Opinion
Banks that are planning to move their London operations to EU cities as a result of Brexit are expected to choose their new locations within the next few months. The competition for this post-Brexit business among other major European cities is there
Travel
Over recent years Budapest has gained a reputation as one of Europe's most exciting and cultural cities. It is fully deserving of this unofficial accolade, and not just because of its gargantuan parliament building (the third largest in the world aft
Opinion
In the first economic report it has released since Americans voted for Donald Trump last November, the EU Commission states that the soon-to-be-27 member bloc is "assailed by risks" and faces "large uncertainties". The threats posed to the EU's econo
Opinion
The soon-to-be-announced verdict in Rodrigo Rato's fraud trial is, for many Spaniards, imbued with a symbolic importance. Rato, former head of the International Monetary Fund and ex-deputy prime minister and economy minister in Mariano Rajoy's govern
Opinion
There were no surprises this Monday, when Spain's National Statistics Institute (INE) released initial data on the country's economic performance in 2016. In the final quarter of last year, the Spanish economy posted growth of 0.7%; overall, it expan
Opinion
Within the Spanish government there is clearly no official 'line' on Brexit. This became evident on Tuesday, when Rajoy told a press conference organised by the newspaper ABC that Brexit was a "serious threat" to Spain. When asked to elaborate he res
Opinion
It was a pleasant surprise this week to hear Spain's economy minister displaying common sense and pragmatism when asked about the latest Brexit news. Interviewed at the World Economic Forum in Davos on Wednesday (one of the cushiest tickets on the di
Opinion
Ever the optimist, Spain's economy and industry minister has recently been hinting that the country's economic growth might exceed the predicted 3.2% for last year. That figure, it should be remembered, was already pretty positive: it's about twice t
LifeStyle
This series ends as it began, with the great poet and Hispanophile Laurie Lee. 'A Rose for Winter' is a love letter to Spain's most iconic region, written when Lee returned with his wife Kati, after a fifteen-year absence, for a three-month tour of "
LifeStyle
One bright June morning in 1934, aged 19, Laurie Lee left his quietly bereft mother standing alone in the garden of their Cotswolds home and started an epic, life-changing walk. This young English poet had no money and had never been abroad before; h
LifeStyle
Jason Webster has written what is surely the most arresting opening sentence in recent travel literature, a sentence that forces difficult, searching questions upon you: "Often we end up doing what we almost want to do because we lack the courage to
LifeStyle
A central vein of disappointment and sadness runs through A Moment of War, Laurie Lee's unrelentingly bleak account of his experiences during the Spanish civil war. As I Walked Out One Midsummer's Morning - the conclusion of which is this book's begi
Opinion
It's not just because the English and Spanish press has been unable to talk of much except Donald Trump for the last week and a half that you've heard very little about Mariano Rajoy's new government. Three weeks have elapsed since the veteran Galici
LifeStyle
George Orwell was lucky to make it out of Spain alive. By a mad irony only conceivable amidst the paranoia of war, the pro-revolutionary line of the organisation for which he had been fighting - the Partido Obrero de Unificación Marxista (POUM: 'The
LifeStyle
The greatest books make you envious of those who have not yet read them, those who you know have a great experience still to come. For Whom the Bell Tolls, Ernest Hemingway's Spanish civil war masterpiece and arguably his best novel, is one such book
LifeStyle
Spain's political landscape is about to undergo titanic shifts. Last Sunday, the coalition of separatist parties in Catalonia, Together for Yes, won a majority in the region's parliamentary elections, and the imminent general election will see the do
LifeStyle
One couldn't wish for a better travel companion than Gerald Brenan. His honesty, curiosity, humour and deep knowledge of Spanish history are all on display in The Face of Spain, written after he and his wife, the American poet Gamel Woolsey, revisite
LifeStyle
It changed my life and made me want to write and explore the world." So says American bull runner and author Bill Hillman of the novel that put a small Spanish town and its annual bull-running fiesta well and truly on the world stage. In the minds
National
Spain's two biggest banks, BBVA and Santander, are already registering the effects of Brexit and Donald Trump's victory in the US election. And ironically, it's the global expansion plans that both these banks have pursued - and which enabled them to