The Government is increasingly certain that Pablo Hernández de Cos will be the next president of the European Central Bank (ECB). The same conviction that he defends in public he also transmits in private but with even more conviction, and before the international media he appears equally firm.
"I am going to defend the excellence of the Spanish candidate. We are optimistic and we are working intensely to ensure that Pablo is at the head of the European Central Bank," said the first vice president and Minister of Economy, Carlos Body, yesterday when Dutch television asked him about Hernández de Cos' chances before participating in the Eurogroup.
During the meeting of Eurozone Economy Ministers, Spain and the Netherlands presented their bets. And the official response from the body's president, Kyriakos Pierrakakis, is that both countries did "an extraordinarily good job in presenting the profiles of their respective candidates." But the feeling among many countries is that the former governor of the Bank of Spain has a much more solid resume than Klaas Knot to replace Christine Lagarde.
Hernández de Cos himself has ensured that this is the case, holding meetings with finance ministers from many countries to which he has presented his project and candidacy, among them the most important ones. And he is also accelerating appointments with those he has not yet had the opportunity to talk to, as this newspaper has learned.
In the financial sphere there is also the feeling that his candidacy is the strongest and that he will achieve the reinforced qualified majority that is needed. This represents the vote in favor of 16 of the 21 countries that make up the eurozone and that represent at least 65% of the population. "I think Pablo is going to take it," summarizes this sector.
And the PP is also working to make Hernández de Cos the next president of the ECB. The popular leader Alberto Núñez Feijóo explained to his colleagues from the European People's Party that the former governor has his full support. He did so during the last meeting of the EPP, last October, and among those who heard his argument was the German Chancellor, Friedrich Merz, who will have a fundamental role in the process.
Because one of the risks for Hernández de Cos is the balance between countries during block negotiations. The next presidency of the ECB will be decided in a package together with the new chief economist and the seat that Isabel Schnabel will leave on the Council. And the first of these two positions, the one now occupied by Philip Lane, was highly coveted by France. This, added to the fact that the vice president of the Central Bank is the Croatian Boris Vujcic, could take away any possibility for the Spaniard since there would be no representative from the north.
But now Germany also seems to be interested in that position of chief economist, which a priori could be positive for Hernández de Cos. And, in any case, even from France it is slipping that the former governor is a better candidate than Knot.
Nor does it seem entirely positive that the President of the Government, Pedro Sánchez, is most likely going to miss a key summit in which the presidents and prime ministers are going to negotiate the ECB succession process. It will be this Friday, at the informal meeting in Dublin and to which the leader of the Spanish Executive has not confirmed his attendance since it coincides with the start of the electoral campaign.
And at the extraordinary summit at the end of this month the intention is for the decision to be made now. "We are working with a very tight schedule. To be frank, the ideal would be to have a final decision before the end of the year. And this is because Christine Lagarde has already publicly declared that she will remain in her position until February 7," Pierrakakis said yesterday.
This approach would effectively mean that the positions would be decided this month. But there would still be one more appointment, the one in December, which is the last of the year. Although what the Government of Spain does not want in any case is for the selection process to be mixed with the negotiations of the next European budget. That would complicate things a lot and could ruin all the work.
