đ Spain's Great Train Robbery
Plus: Salvame is back! (sorta) and blackouts can't stop Spanish spenders.
Madrid | Issue #101
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Copper Theft in Spain Happens Mainly on the Train
Spain really had a lot on last week. A historic blackout. Then a national holiday. Then a Madrid holiday to celebrate rising up against the French invaders (and losing). And the cherry on the top? A massive train outage Sunday that stranded over 10,000 people. Who says Spain doesnât know how to have fun? (No one says that, actually.)
The news. On Sunday, just six days after the blackout stranded 35,000 train passengers, the theft of copper wiring along the tracks at five spots in the towns of Los YĂ©benes and Manzaneque (Toledo) on the Madrid-Sevilla line affected 10,700 passengers on 30 trains that suffered hours-long delays or were canceled. Making it all worse, a train from Iryo (an Italian competitor to Renfe) had a problem with overhead electrical wires along the same line. Bad luck!
Why so many? Many Madrileños were returning after taking advantage of the four-day holiday to go to the beach, while others were heading to Sevilla to enjoy this weekâs Feria (if you donât know what that is, check out our Instagram guest!).
A theft? So what? Thatâs the thing. Stealing copperâfrom trains, businesses, abandoned buildingsâis a pretty common crime. It pays âŹ4-6/kilo, according to El Español, and some Eastern European gangs apparently specialize in it.
Blame game. But because no one knows exactly what happened, Spainâs political parties started to speculate, and blame each other. Remember last weekâs Gran ApagĂłn? Just like that. So hereâs a new episode of Who Needs Facts When Youâve Got Opinions?
Transport Minister Oscar Puente kicked it off Sunday night, when he posted on X that âWe have suffered an act of serious sabotageââthat is, not a theft, but an act meant to cause chaos and, perhaps, make the PSOE-led government look bad.
Double down. The Transport Minister/PSOE attack dog dug in deeper Monday, claiming the value of the stolen copper was only some âŹ1,000 đ°, which would make economic motivations difficult to understand: "Everything clearly points to a deliberate actâŠto cause damage."
PSOE pile-on. Other government leaders amplified Puenteâs sabotage claims, with the PSOEâs parliamentary spokesman Patxi LĂłpez lowering the value of the copper to âŹ500 (pretty soon itâll be free!) and adding: "Either we have the dumbest thieves in the world, or it's something else."
Well, maybe not. Government spokeswoman Pilar AlegrĂa backed off the sabotage claims and the Interior Ministry noted that copper was increasingly valuable so theft sorta makes sense, but the opposition had already jumped on PM Pedro SĂĄnchezâs government for what they claimed was using the scare word sabotage to cover up its own incompetence at providing security on public infrastructure.
The Troll Queen. Madrid President Isabel DĂaz Ayuso of the opposition center-right PP rolled the copper drama up with last weekâs blackout and blamed the government for both (2x1 is a great deal!): "Everything the government directly manages is chaos and it's getting worse." Now, donât get her wrong, "no one is in favor of sabotage, and if there is, we condemn it. But the truth is that nothing works with this government."
A bit more. The PP's Carmen FĂșnez, denounced a "lack of infrastructure security" for which the Transport Minister was to blame: "The person responsible for preventing the problem is portraying himself as a victim."
PP boss Alberto Nuñez FeijĂło also spoke. But as usual, what he said wasnât memorable. Like, he said that images of people stranded on trains for the second week in a row was embarrassing, and Spaniards shouldnât have to pay ever more taxes for worse services, etc.
Well, Spanish politics may be crabby, but at least Spainâs Great Train Robbery gave us this:
More news below. đđ
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đŹ Five things to discuss at dinner parties this week
1. đĄ Spain lost âŹ400M in the blackoutâbut already got half back!
Last weekâs historic blackout feels so over by now. If anything, it showed the world that when weâre (temporarily) faced with going back to the Stone Age, we just chill and hang out with friends.
But while we were group hugging and singing songs by Jarabe de Palo in Plaza Olavide, we were not taking into account one teeny, tiny detail: the power outageâs sudden shock to the Spanish economy. Which was⊠pretty bad.
In the red. Consumer spending collapsed by 34% while the Iberian Peninsula was plunged into darkness, according to estimates from CaixaBank Research.
Your
moneycredit card is no good here. The data, pulled from anonymized card payments, ATM withdrawals, and e-commerce activity, provides the first serious attempt to quantify the immediate economic fallout from the massive grid failure.
No electricity, no đł. The blackout, which began shortly after noon on April 28, disrupted everything from rail networks and mobile coverage to point-of-sale systems and digital banking infrastructure.
No, no, and no. Card readers were down, online payments failed, and ATMs were out of service. That meant Spaniards had little choice but to pause most economic activity (hence the collective singing and dancing), especially in sectors like retail, hospitality, and mobility, which rely heavily on digital transactions.
Island spending. In-person card spending by people on the mainland was 42% lower than that of residents in the Balearic Islands, the Canary Islands, Ceuta, and Melillaâall territories that were not directly affected by the power outage.
At first glance, things looked⊠bad. Some early analyses floated loss estimates upwards of âŹ1 billion, driven by the scale and impact of the outage. But CaixaBankâs updated models now put the net loss closer to âŹ400 million, or around 0.1% of quarterly GDP. A hit, but not a catastrophe.
Why so little? Turns out the spending didnât disappear: it was just delayed. As soon as the lights came back on and the systems recovered, so did consumer behavior. (Also, lots of places took payment in cash and didnât report it to the tax man. Just sayinâ.)
Boing. Within the 48 hours following the blackout, CaixaBank observed a sharp rebound in transaction volumes, as people rushed to make up for missed purchases, suggesting a compensatory surge.
Retail therapy. E-commerce also bounced back, with nearly half of Mondayâs digital sales drop recovered in the days that followed.
Bounceback. By factoring in this rebound, CaixaBank revised the net spending loss for the blackout day to 15%, much lower than the initial 34% collapse.
The Ministry of Economy echoed these findings, estimating that around âŹ140 million had already been recovered by the end of the same week.
This will leave a âmodestâ dent in Spainâs Q2 economic data, but the broader trajectory remains strong. Weâre still expected to grow by 2.6% in 2025, outpacing most of the eurozone countries. đ
2. đ Gen Z â€ïž Vox? Spainâs youth warms up to the far-right despite Trump slump
Hereâs a surprising plot twist in Spainâs political landscape: Vox is becoming the party of choice for many young voters. According to the latest 40dB. poll for El PaĂs and Cadena SER, Santiago Abascalâs far-right formation now ranks first in voting intention among 18- to 24-year-olds, with 21.2% support, beating both PSOE (19%) and the PP (15.9%) in that demographic.
Not just a clean youth wave. However, the real frontrunner among young Spaniards is⊠apathy: more than 30% say theyâre undecided, abstaining, or would cast a blank vote (honestly, can you blame them?).
Still, the fact that Vox tops the listâespecially with its anti-feminist, anti-migrant rhetoricâsuggests disillusionment and online culture may be driving new voter behavior.
Zooming out, Vox is also the only major party to slightly improve on its 2023 election results, sitting at 13.4% in estimated national vote share, up one point since the last general election.
What makes Voxâs popularity with Gen Z even more striking is how gendered its support remains.
Men and women â€. Among young men, the party polls at 16%, while among women it drops to just 10.8%âa 5.2-point gap that mirrors broader trends across Europe, where far-right parties perform better with disaffected young men.
This gap underscores the partyâs polarizing messaging: while it resonates with some young voters craving disruption, many others, especially women, are put off by its reactionary stance on gender equality and LGBTQ+ rights.
Not all good news for Vox. At the same time, Vox just suffered its sharpest monthly drop in recent polling (down 0.7 points), which analysts suspect may be tied to Voxâs vocal support for Donald Trumpâs short-lived tariff blitz on Europe.
FYI, Vox wasnât alone in paying the Trump tax: SALF, the far-far-right movement led by Alvise PĂ©rez (also pro-Trump), dropped 0.6 points this month. (Last week we told you the party was imploding, and this Tuesday its only two MEPs decided to officially call it quits and registered as âindependentâ. đ„).
Meanwhile, lefties Sumar and Podemos are still bleeding support, particularly among undecided progressives and young voters disappointed with the leftâs internal fractures. Voxâs Gen Z appeal may prove to be more than just a social media trend.
3. đłïž PM SĂĄnchez launches Eurovision for bank mergers
PM Pedro SĂĄnchez got some uncomfortable news last week when Spainâs CNMC (a competition overseer kinda like the U.S.âs FTC) approved the merger of two of Spainâs biggest banksâBBVA and Banco Sabadell.
Concessions. After BBVA agreed to a series of concessionsâlargely aimed at keeping money flowing to small businesses and at protecting customers in areas where the merger would drastically shrink bank optionsâthe commission unanimously approved the merger.
Not good news for Mr Handsome. The issue for the PM is that Banco Sabadell is based in Catalonia, and having it taken over by BBVA, a Basque bank thatâs really based in Madrid, would cut the Catalan business eliteâs economic power. And Catalonia is a top PSOE voter base. Oh, and the PSOEâs far-left government partners hate bank mergers. Actually, even the center-right opposition, the PP, is not big on a merger that could hurt small businesses either.
So what does a PM do? If your competition regulator says a merger is okay, how do you throw sand in the gears? Hmmm. How about asking everyone in Spain to offer their opinion on the merger in an improvised public consultation with a short deadline? Nah, that would just be ridiculousâŠ
So thatâs whatâs happening. SanchĂ©z used a speech at the Monday opening of the annual meeting of the Cercle dâEconomia, a Catalan business society, to announce that his government would do just thatâand he did it without previously warning the chairmen of the two banks, who were in attendance at the meeting. đ€·
Maybe some specifics? Spanish citizens, association, and business groups will have until May 16 to respond via an online form of 10 questions, run by the Ministry of Economy, to express their opinion on whether there are "criteria of general interest other than the defense of competition that may be affected by the BBVA/Banco Sabadell transaction"âand to suggest âremediesâ to fix them.
Why? Presumably, the Economy Minister Carlos Cuerpo could use the process to find stories of those who believe they will be hurt by the merger, and then use those stories to bring the merger to a cabinet vote on the grounds that it goes again the âgeneral interestâ of Spanish people and needs further remedies.
Next step. The Economy Minister can bring the merger to the cabinet within 15 work days of its approval by the CNMC (until May 27), and if he does, the executive branch (aka Mr Handsome) has 30 days to approve the merger or ease or toughen its conditions.
Is this a serious thing? There are lots of reasons to worry about bank consolidationâlack of competition in loans being a big oneâand parties across the political spectrum have those worries. But putting an already approved bank merger up for a Eurovision vote in the hope of killing it to keep regional business supporters on your side? Maybe not the best look.
4. đŽ Mallorca moves to ban new short-term rentals in Apartment buildings
