Bankia to wipe out 350,000 shareholders

The measure, which will hit shareholders who were encouraged by aggressive marketing tactics to invest in the company, is seen as vital if the nationalized bank is to be refloated.

A source close to the Bank of Spain said Bankia would receive 18 billion euros of European money by Friday and launch a capital increase in the first half of January when current shareholders will lose practically their entire investment.

Under the European Union plan to prop up Spain's banking sector, shareholders must be the first in the queue to suffer losses. This has already been the case in Ireland where shareholders in Anglo Irish Bank were left with nothing.

“Are we looking into leaving shareholders with something? Yes. How much? That's too soon to say. Will it be very little? For sure,” said the source on condition of anonymity.

“But that will be purely symbolic. I can assure you they will lose up to the shirt on their back.”

The source also said the issue was under discussion with the EU authorities and that the final figure would be known when the capital increase takes place in January.

Another source with direct knowledge of the process said the final value of the shares would be close to nothing but that neither the Spanish government nor the bank wanted to send the message that Bankia's shareholders had lost it all.

Hundreds of thousands of Spaniards, some retired people with no in-depth financial knowledge, invested their savings into Bankia shares when the bank was listed in July 2011. Shares have plummeted more than 80 percent since then.

Some small savers, lured by aggressive marketing campaigns, also bought high-risk instruments, such as preference shares or subordinated debt, on which they will also suffer steep losses.

Enrique Marquez, a 66-year-old retired technician, said he had invested 7,000 euros in shares and more than 70,000 euros in preference shares with Bankia.

“The bank manager advised me to buy the shares. He told me it was interesting, that the staff were investing too and that it could be very profitable in the medium term,” he said.

“It seems to be to have been managed extraordinarily badly. It is a total cock-up. I've been duped on the preference shares and I've been duped on the ordinary shares. It's been an abuse of trust.”

Marquez says his future is more uncertain now because of the money he has lost. The interest payments on the preference shares supplemented his pension but they dried up in May or June.

Shares in Bankia, which was nationalized in May, fell 13 percent on Thursday after the state bank rescue fund FROB disclosed it had a negative valuation of 4.2 billion euros while its parent group BFA was worth a negative 10.4 billion euros.

Separately, the FROB also announced it would take over 99.9 percent of Banco de Valencia before it is sold to CaixaBank, while shareholders in other nationalized lenders NCG Banco and Catalunya Banc will be fully wiped out.

In Ireland's Anglo Irish Bank, shareholders whose equity was once worth 13 billion euro were left with nothing following the bank's 4-billion-euro recapitalization and immediate nationalization in January 2009.

Anglo ultimately needed another 25.3 billion euros of state money, which was funded by a “promissory note” or government IOU that Ireland is now trying to restructure.

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