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19 September 2017 – Expansión
Interview with Álvaro de Remedios (pictured above, left) and Jaime Carvajal (pictured above, right), President and CEO of Arcano / The executives are committed to backing the Spanish economy and do not believe that Cataluña will break the rule of law.
In 2003, after a lifetime as an investment banker, Álvaro de Remedios (Madrid, 1968) decided to found Arcano and he was soon joined by Jaime Carvajal (Madrid, 1964). Both shared the vision of accompanying their clients throughout the transaction process and of placing the knowledge of senior executives at their disposal. Fourteen years later, Arcano has 15 partners, a workforce of more than 140 people, offices in Madrid, Barcelona and New York, and it has added the management of alternative assets and real estate advice to its core investment banking business.
Q: The boutique advisors have completed quite a few high-profile operations in recent months.
Jaime Carvajal: It is a world that is growing. The bankers at boutique firms have a lot of experience and the teams are more senior than in the large investment banks, in general. But sometimes, it is good to have both profiles involved in an operation. For this reason, Jefferies makes so much sense for us.
– What fruits are being born from the alliance with Jefferies?
Álvaro de Remedios: We are Jefferies’ partners in Spain. We benefit from its status as a global bank with an international presence and a great sectoral specialisation, and they benefit from our local presence and closeness to the market. Apart from the fact that we have business cards with different logos on them, we act as a single firm. We signed the alliance more than two years ago. The first year was spent understanding each other’s businesses, and during this second year, we have participated in several operations together (…).
Q: Do you expect to see an upturn in corporate operations?
Á.R: Yes, we think so, although that could just be our perception and not the view shared by the sector. We have closed around 30 advisory operations in the last 18 months. We are all very busy.
Q: Are the prices of operations rising due to the high degree of liquidity?
Á.R: There is a lot of liquidity and prices are clearly rising, but there is one key element that is different to before the crisis and that is the fact that financings are much more prudent than before. Prices are higher, but they are not off the scale, and financing is more conservative because investors are being cautious. The scars from the crisis are still there and that is a lesson.
Q: Are investors willing to earn less in this environment?
J.C: The very low interest rates have forced a change in expectations and has resulted in the arrival of new investors, such as infrastructure and pension funds, which are willing to forgo profitability in exchange for assuming lower risk. That is what is driving up prices.
Q: Is the real estate market at its peak in Spain?
Á.R: We are not betting on a rise in interest rates or an increase in prices; we bet on our own added value: we buy a building, we do it up and that is how we generate returns. Our expectation is that prices are not going to grow by much more in the real estate market, but, with our strategy, we are still generating returns (…).
Q: Is the economic outlook bright?
J.C: At Arcano, we started to back the Spanish economy in 2012 and we continue to do so. There are no significant risks threatening the economy: the banking system is robust and the problem of Popular has been resolved. The only clear problem is the inevitable increase in interest rates, but that is not going to happen in the short term, at least in Europe (…).
Original story: Expansión (by S. Arancibia, I. Abril and A. Stumpf.)
Translation: Carmel Drake