Sumar opens another battle with the bank: it wants to limit the payment of dividends to its shareholders

Daniel Viana

Updated Tuesday, March 5, 2024-13:41

Sumar not only wants to make the banking tax permanent, but in its battle against what it calls "extraordinary profits" it also asks that entities

limit the payment of dividends to their shareholders and the repurchase of shares

.

"The ECB should limit the distribution of dividends, as it already did between 2019 and 2021, and prohibit the buyback of shares by banks, since it reduces their capital and as a result credit, and also delays their modernization, in particular, in the way to manage risk," points out the party that is part of the Government coalition in the document

Using the extraordinary profits of banking to compensate households and reinforce banking solvency

that it has presented to the Government today.

The person responsible for doing so has been Carlos Martín Urriza, economic spokesman for Vice President Yolanda Díaz's party, and it seems difficult for the European Central Bank to make a decision of this type.

But it is a new

example of the battle that Sumar has open with the banks

, on which he also wants to permanently impose the tax on the sector that is currently temporary.

"The coalition government has agreed to transform the temporary tax on banks

into a permanent tax

. Its collection was 1,214 million in 2023. The tax is a way to recover a part of the extraordinary profits of the banks and allocate them to protect the most vulnerable households and businesses from the economic consequences of the war in Ukraine," the document states.

"From the pockets of households"

In the development of its proposals, Sumar also analyzes the origin of what it calls "benefits rained down from the sky or, rather,

from the pockets of households and taxpayers

."

"Mortgaged households have seen their mortgage payments increase by around 450 euros per month on average with the rise in interest rates since the beginning of 2022, while the remuneration of their savings by banks has not increased at the same rate." than what was done in other European countries," they explain in Sumar.