Austerity plans are rarely good news for capital markets. But one item in the four-year package of public spending cuts and tax measures announced by the Portuguese government in March has helped sugar the pill for the country's investment bankers: a €6bn privatisation programme.
"Privatisations combined with a number of robust companies actively pursuing opportunities to finance themselves could see the beginning of a new cycle for the equity market," says Jorge Freire Cardoso, an executive board member of Caixa-Banco de Investimento, the investment arm of state-owned Caixa Geral de Dépositos (CGD).
