The president of Banco Santander, Ana Botín, has stated in a debate at the World Economic Forum that "there is a risk that the European Union becomes a museum", urging Governments to "pause regulation", undertake reforms, and "create the framework to let the private sector do its job without much interference."
The banker has expressed herself, as usual, in European terms without explicitly referring to Spain, but has been very clear that "the EU is not a museum" for now, there is a danger that it may become one due to the perspective of Europe losing competitiveness against the new era of deregulation in the US under the Trump administration.
She has agreed with the American economist Larry Summers that one of the great challenges of the moment is controlling public debt, so Botín considers the Governments' power to finance a new industrial policy very limited. "There will be no financing, because there is already too much debt. So, it depends on the private sector. It is the private sector that will create the wealth that we can then redistribute," Botín emphasized.
The banker did not call for deregulation like in the US, but she did insist that the EU should "pause regulation" so that the private sector can unleash its full potential and the financial sector can finance it. "We simply have to do more and faster, and for once, be ahead of the United States."
The Spanish executive, a regular in the elite circles at Davos, has stressed that Europe still has time and that significant advances in science and innovation continue to be made in the EU. "Europe has a range of options in the economy where if we get it right, we can do very well", she argued. The alternative will be "the museum."
"I have learned from Larry over the years that putting some numbers helps. So, if the difference between the global economy growing at 3% or 5% means $3 trillion per year, that's $500 per person on the planet. That is a huge amount of money that would allow us to pay off the debt faster," she stated to the audience at the Davos Forum in a panel organized by CNBC.
Botín took the opportunity to deny that Banco Santander intends to sell its subsidiary in the UK and leave the country. "It is key for us, and we will continue."