BBVA’s strategy to curb its exposure in the real estate market continues to bear fruit. The Group announced the sale of a 14 office-building portfolio in Spain, codenamed Project Boston.

The Observatorio Empresarial contra la Pobreza (Business Observatory to Combat Poverty), with the support of BBVA, has published a report entitled The road to youth employment. What can businesses do. The report addresses the problem of youth unemployment and its consequences from a number of angles.

BBVA Compass economists lay out their reasons for raising their estimate to three rate hikes in 2017 in their latest Fed Watch report, pointing to the underlying strength of the economy and a series of hawkish speeches by key Federal Open Market Committee members.

The key to have the best professional team requires attracting, training and retaining talent. Aware of this, BBVA Corporate & Investment Banking, BBVA’s wholesale banking area, is announcing the fifth edition of its Graduate Training Programme, aiming at recruiting and developing the best junior talent available.

Mario Draghi did not announce any new changes in monetary policy at Thursday’s press conference, but the latest European Central Bank (ECB) meeting did lead to some updates. On the one hand, the ECB is more optimistic about economic growth. On the other, it is raising its 2017 inflation forecast to 1.7% (from 1.3% in December) due to growing energy prices, but it barely changed its core inflation projection. And last, but not least, it added some nuances to its wording, which could be the prelude to changes in its monetary policy,  BBVA Research notes in its ECB Watch report.

While ISIS lost ground in Syria and Iraq, Al-Qaeda resumed its offensive operations. Meanwhile, tensions between Russia and Ukraine stabilized after last month’s sharp conflict escalation. Geopolitical tensions in China could intensify as uncertainties regarding the US policy stance in the region remained and North Korea remains testing.

For more information, please visit BBVA Research’s website

BBVA celebrates International Working Women’s Day with further progress as regards work/life balance, entrepreneurship and professional promotion. This is the right time to look back on one year of initiatives that promote female talent and try to mitigate the social injustices that affect women.

In a meeting organized by the Rafael del Pino Foundation to discuss the future of Europe, José Manuel González-Páramo said that the “European Union is more necessary today than ever” to rise up to find a solution to the Old Continent’s most pressing issues. According to BBVA’s Executive Board Director, the EU now faces the challenge, but also the opportunity, to plot its future without the UK, one of its traditional and more important, partners.

On the financial plane, BBVA’s Executive Board Director highlighted the EU’s achievements in its path towards building a banking union. However, he warned about the need to keep moving ahead with the reforms and completing the following stage in the process: the rollout of the EDIS, the European Deposit Insurance Scheme.

In a year marked by the reactivation of the high-yield bond market, and growing investor interest on ultra-long issue maturities, and despite a string of global macroeconomic developments that had a severe impact on the fixed income market, BBVA performed remarkably well in the bond origination market, even managing to surpass the total volume it placed in the market in 2015.

If you were pressed to name the skills that are earning a premium in today's job market, you'd likely list software-coding or data analysis. You wouldn't be wrong. But we've found that skills like cognitive and social intelligence, entrepreneurial and leadership skills, the ability to adapt and innovate — skills that can't be automated, in other words, at least not yet — are also earning a premium. And that is good news for low-skilled workers who may be fearful for their futures in a world of unrelenting technological change and globalization.