Spanish Banks Overseas Push Reflects Doubts on Recovery at Home

A flurry of attempts by Spanish banks to buy foreign lenders may say more about the weakness of their home market than the strength of the opportunities chased abroad.

So far this year, CaixaBank SA has bid 1.1 billion euros ($1.18 billion) to buy the rest of Portugal’s Banco BPI SA that it doesn’t own, and Banco Sabadell SA has offered about 1.7 billion-pounds ($2.5 billion) for Britain’s TSB Banking Group Plc. Banco Popular Espanol SA also looked at buying Citigroup’s Central American consumer business before pulling out of talks.