First Intervention of the BBVA Shareholders Meeting
Shareholders of BBVA, Bilbao, March 13, 2015
Good afternoon, Mr. Chairman, members of the Board, ladies and gentlemen. My name is Gemma Amoros and I speak as a member of the Delás Study Center for Peace on behalf of the campaign BBVA without arms.I speak on behalf of dozens of shareholders who have given 609 575 shares to the campaign BBVA without arms to raise their voice in this forum today. We urge you, on their behalf, to modify your policy of controversial investments.
BBVA says it respects human rights in its business strategies. However, it is the Spanish bank that has set aside more capital to the arms industry in the period 2005- 2013 than any other. The total investment of the bank in arms for that period was 3.626 million euros. How you can respect human rights by promoting and weapons like this?
Of this total, 2.657 million are for loans to companies researching or manufacturing weapons; nearly 600 million was dedicated to finance exports of Italian weapons; 338 million was invested in bond and commercial paper of weapons; and 31 million euros were invested in mutual funds, stocks and bonds of companies in the defense industry.