throughout the crisis, the Spanish private sector became more highly levered than Italy, France,
or Germany, peaking at above 200% of GDP in 2009. Companies experienced difficulty making debt payments during the crisis, and are now attempting to decrease the amount of debt on their
balance sheets in order to improve their leverage and coverage ratios. Even though spreads on interest rates for large companies in Spain have decreased, 51 few large Spanish companies are looking to borrow