The Diplomat
King Philip VI will preside over the inauguration of the 11th edition of the Spain Investors Day (SID) Forum, which will be held in Madrid on 13 and 14 January despite the passage of the Filomena storm and amidst strong security measures against the COVID-19 pandemic.
The meeting will bring together, for two days, more than 200 international investors from Australia, Belgium, Canada, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Malaysia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, the United Kingdom and the United States with the main executives of 46 Spanish listed companies (mostly from the Ibex-35 and representatives from all the activity sectors in our country), who will explain the situation of their companies and the plans for the exercise that is now beginning.
The inauguration, which will be presided over by the King – who has chaired the forum’s Committee of Honour since its first edition – will be attended by the Ministers of Industry, Trade and Tourism, Reyes Maroto, and Inclusion, Social Security and Migration, José Luis Escrivá. The Mayor of Madrid, José Luis Martínez-Almeida, and the Secretary of State for Trade and President of ICEX, Xiana Méndez, will also speak at the event.
The Fourth Vice-president and Minister for Ecological Transition, Teresa Ribera, and the Third Vice-president and Minister of Economic Affairs and Digital Transformation, Nadia Calviño, will also participate in the SID, and will each give a talk to explain the Government’s plans for this year to international investors. The Government will be represented at the closing ceremony by the Minister of Foreign Affairs, Arancha González Laya, who will be accompanied by the Governor of the Bank of Spain, Pablo Hernández de Cos, and the President of the CNMV, Rodrigo Buenaventura.
Sources from the organisation told The Diplomat yesterday that the event will go ahead despite the Filomena storm. Both the King and the rest of the authorities will be the only people present at the event and the rest of the participants (investors and companies) will do so by videoconference. These restrictions, as well as the suspension of the usual lunch and dinner at this forum and the change of venue (initially it was going to be the Palacio de la Bolsa in Madrid, but in the end the venue was chosen to be the Pavilion in the Cecilio Rodríguez Garden, in the Retiro Park in Madrid), form part of the security measures related to the COVID-19 and, at the same time, will facilitate the holding of the forum despite the storm.
Spain Investors Day is a company of the Estudio de Comunicación group, which has BNP Paribas, Europe’s leading financial services company, and Exane BNP Paribas, one of Europe’s leading equity intermediaries, as strategic partners. The Forum is sponsored by international firms such as Grant Thornton and Endesa, which joined as a sponsor on 10 December. “The SID takes on a special role on this occasion, given the crisis situation and the significant fall in the Spanish stock market in 2020. It will therefore be a unique opportunity to strengthen confidence in the Spanish economy in a scenario of uncertainty and generate more activity and employment”, said the organisers.
