Selling a company is only the close of one chapter; what is truly decisive for our economy is where those resources go. Today the trend is to preserve the capital received and take very little risk. Breaking with this inertia and reinvesting in the productive fabric is the engine we need to keep growing.


Although the formula for integration between Puig and Estée Lauder is still unknown, and points to a significant role for the Catalan multinational in the new group, the announcement of advanced negotiations has led us to ask once again why so many major Catalan companies have been sold in recent times. This dynamic has been a source of concern, insofar as the disappearance of corporate headquarters reflects a loss of vigor and is a drag on the country’s future.

In recent decades, many Catalan business dynasties have faded away, just as quite a few SMEs continue to opt for selling. The reasons are varied, among them the lack of family succession, the difficulty of managing a large and heterogeneous shareholder base, fear of a future full of uncertainty, the demands of a hypercompetitive economy and the accumulated fatigue of so many small business owners. Moreover, Catalonia is not an exception: this selling trend can be seen across Europe, although it is more pronounced in Spain, given that the size of our companies is often insufficient to compete with European ones, not to mention Asian or American ones.

The trend is to preserve the money received and take very little risk.

This intensity in company sales should not worry us, since in an open economy it is normal for some companies to sell, others to buy and, above all, for new business initiatives to emerge. Furthermore, in such a demanding global environment, many companies have no better alternative for survival than to join a larger group. Likewise, the very active role of investment funds, which have enormous resources to invest in acquiring companies, greatly favors transactions. For this reason, the question is not whether many companies change owners, but what the selling shareholders do with the money they receive.

What is desirable for the proper functioning of a modern and dynamic economy is that a good part of what is received from the sale of a company returns to the productive world, by acquiring other companies or by taking part, as one more partner, in new and ambitious projects. However, looking back over decades, in which quite a few Catalan family dynasties have grown notably wealthy from selling their companies, we see that the dominant trend is to preserve what was received and take very little risk. It is understandable that the small business owner opts for a comfortable management of their assets, investing in real estate and highly secure financial products, but it would be desirable for large fortunes, the product of selling a family company passed down from generation to generation, not to proceed in the same way; that, besides inheriting the wealth, they also make their own the spirit of those who founded the business dynasty.

You can read the full article in La Vanguardia.