Joaquín Almunia on Competition in Financial Markets

6 February 2014

The UCLU Economics and Finance Society, in cooperation with the UCLU European Society, is very proud to welcome Mr Joaquin Almunia, European Commissioner for Competition and a Vice-President in the second college of the Barroso Commission.

In this talk, Mr Almunia will address in particular the topic of Competition in Financial Markets. He recently took measures against several banks fining them a total of 1.7 billion euros for forming illegal cartels to rig interest rates. It will be the occasion for him to present what his role entails in more detail and to come back on his many years spent at the European Commission. He will refer as well to other cases he had to deal with as Europe's anti-trust chief, involving companies such as technology giant Google. 

About the speaker

Mr Almunia graduated in Law and Economics from the University of Deusto (Bilbao) and later followed the "Senior managers in Government" programme at the Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University. He has been an eminent actor in Spanish politics for many years, being appointed successively Minister of Employment and Minister of Public Administration under the government of Felipe Gonzalez. Mr Almunia then went on to become the Leader of the PSOE (the Spanish Socialist party) from 1997 to 2000 and was candidate for Prime Minister in 2000. Prior to his current role, he was European Commissioner for economic and monetary affairs (2004-2010). With this breadth of experiences, Mr Almunia is in an excellent position to discuss the main issues related to European, economic and current affairs.