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Helping children with up to 200,000 euros to buy an apartment does not count as a donation

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The housing crisis is one of the main problems for young people (and not so young) in Spain. In this context, family support in the purchase of a home is a key element: many young people need the help of their parents or relatives to be able to assume the entrance of a house. The main obstacle to this family aid is that the Treasury consider it as a donation and, therefore, is subject to tax obligations. A measure of the Government of Extremadura that has entered into force in 2026 seeks to eliminate this obstacle and allows parents or direct relatives of young people can donate to them up to a maximum of 200,000 euros without having to pay the Inheritance and Donation Tax. However, this exemption is not a blank check. There are strict rules that must be followed to avoid a tax scare. Donation for first home. The Government of Extremadura has updated its regulations on the Inheritance and Donation Tax (ISD) to allow a 100% reduction in this tax for the first 200,000 euros donated to descendants, provided that this donation is intended for the purchase of your first habitual residence in Extremadura. He article 21 of the new tax regulations establishes an exempt limit of 200,000 euros that covers cash donations as help for the purchase of housing, but also extends to direct transmission of homes or plots of land to build it (in this case it is limited to 120,000 euros). In this way, the exempt amount of 180,000 euros that was already contemplated by the previous regulations is increased and new requirements are added. It is not a blank check. To benefit from this exemption, the recipient must be under 36 years of age when the donation is formalized and tax base in personal income tax It cannot exceed 28,000 euros individually or 45,000 euros jointly. This focuses help on young people with medium or low incomes who do not have the necessary capital to make a down payment or build their own home. This exemption does not apply if the recipient already has assets greater than the first tranche of the state ISD scale, set at more than 402,678.11 euros. Furthermore, the donation must be registered in a public deed before a notary, specifying that it is intended for the first home and habitual residence, the purchase of which must occur within a maximum period of six months. On the other hand, the beneficiary must be listed as the owner of the home for a minimum of five subsequent years, except for death or justified causes such as job transfer. Other conditions to take into account are that that first home and habitual residence must be in Extremadura, which has a double usefulness since it not only contributes to eliminating fiscal barriers to facilitate this donation, but also seeks the reduce depopulation of the territory. Practical cases. Suppose that parents donate 190,000 euros to their 32-year-old daughter in Cáceres to buy her first apartment in February 2026. The beneficiary meets the age, income and personal income tax requirements, formalizes the donation before a notary and signs the purchase of her home on time. This family must complete the Inheritance and Donation Tax settlement process, but the payment will be zero euros as it is 100% subsidized. However, the daughter must live in and be the owner (even if it is shared ownership) of the apartment she has purchased for at least five years. If you sell it after a year due to an unjustified move, you will lose the tax credit and must regularize the donation with a surcharge. In Xataka | The Great Wealth Transfer: the movement from boomers to millennials that will transfer millions between generations Image | Unsplash (Christian Dubovan)

found RAM memory modules worth 500 euros in the worst time to buy them

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A Reddit user counted this week how he had a singular habit: rummaging through his neighborhood trash can in case he found some hardware treasure. And boy did he find it: among other things, he got two 32 GB DDR4 memory modules. Those modules thrown away as waste are a little treasureespecially because with the memory crisis Its market value exceeds 500 euros. what has happened. The user, who uses the alias “ringosbigfuckingnose” indicated that he makes regular visits to the local landfill in his area to look through the garbage that people throw away in search of components for their old PCs. He pointed out how he often comes across equipment from which he can salvage things, but the other day he found a real treasure: A Samsung monitor A 5.25″ floppy drive A 5-bay Drobo NAS Two 32 GB DDR4 memory modules A 10th generation Core i7 with its fan An ASUS motherboard A real find, without a doubt, but above all for one thing. 64 GB of RAM is 500 euros in your pocket. All of these components have value, of course, but it is especially striking that I found those two memory modules with a total of 64 GB. If you take a look around stores like Amazon or PcComponentes you will quickly see that two 32 GB DDR4 modules have a price that today is difficult to lower than the 500 or almost 600 euros. An absolute treasure. An ingenious solution to the memory crisis. What this user has achieved is to find a unique solution to the RAM memory crisis that has caused prices to rise. they shoot in an absolutely extraordinary way. It’s not likely that many people are throwing away memory modules lightly, but there are certainly plenty of people who find real treasures – especially in the form of old consoles and computers – in garbage dumps and recycling centers. And what for some is trash, for others is a small (or big) gem. On TikTok it’s easy find videos with people finding some devices that may be damaged, but that have possibility of being repaired. Electronic waste that is not waste. The Reddit user commented that he lives in a city of about 8,000 people, and the local landfill has a container for recycling electronic waste, something similar to what happens with the recycling centers or clean points that we find in Spain. It was in that part where this user found all those products as is, available for pickup. electronic waste. As they pointed out in Windows Centralthere are studies that indicate that less than a quarter of electronic waste is recycled properly. That means there is a lot of money wasted in the form of still valid hardware and also minerals and components that can be mined from those components. Image | Eugenia Pan’kiv In Xataka | The AI ​​leaves another news that will make the day worse for gamers: NVIDIA will not launch new graphics this year, according to The Information

I was about to buy the best-selling Chinese motorcycle in Spain. Until I read the fine print

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Chinese motorcycles They are driving the Spanish crazy. So much so that they are achieving the unthinkable: snatch the throne to the historic Japanese Honda and Yamaha. It is no wonder, since both in terms of performance and price, what the Chinese proposals offer is simply unbeatable. Servidor was recently at the Zontes dealership to test what is currently the best-selling A2 license scooter in Spain: the 368G. I went down from trying it convinced of the purchase, until I read the fine print. One that has a lot to do with China’s strategy to conquer Europe. The aforementioned. If you don’t understand much about motorcycles, the summary is easy: this motorcycle is “the SUV” with the best quality-price on the market. It costs less than 5,000 euros, has a 368cc engine and almost 40hp of power, and comes with extras such as rear and front cameras with Sony sensors, heated grips as standard, keyless boot and hood, screen with mirroring for the mobile… The equivalent in any traditional brand costs about 1,500 euros more. The rolling smoothness of the motorcycle is excellent, and although the general qualities are somewhat tight (something completely logical, given the price), it is an absolutely winning purchase. Everything good, except for one little problem. We are guinea pigs. China is achieving something unthinkable a few years ago in the world of motorcycles (and cars). They have not come to compete against smaller brands or carve out a niche for themselves. They have landed in Europe to take the top positions in the ranking and end the leadership of traditional brands. Decades of reign that they have managed to end in a very short time. To do this, at least in the territory of motorcycles, something key is needed in a vehicle for daily use and enjoyment: reliability. And to ensure that the bike passes through the workshop frequently, the inspection intervals are especially abnormal. Yes, but. In the case of this Zontes, the maintenance interval is 4,000km. Yes, every 4,000km you have to go to the workshop. To give you some context, its rivals like the Honda 350 ADV They go through the workshop every 12,000km, and the Yamaha Xmax 300 every 5,000km for oil changes and every 10,000 for the rest of the consumables. The brand is completely aware of the problem this poses, and the 2026 model will arrive in summer with maintenance intervals of 6,000km. It is a substantial change, since every 12,000km a 368g will have passed through the workshop three times. One 2026, two. Little by little. Zontes is not alone in this problem. Voge, the Chinese manufacturer that has managed to become the top 1 in the best-selling trail motorcycles in Spain, has several models with service intervals every 6,000km. But in its star versions, such as 900 DSXthis goes up to 10,000km. If they still sell, imagine in a year. There are many bikers who do not put too many kilometers on their motorcycle, or those who are willing to visit the workshop twice a year in exchange for taking a much more equipped, complete and powerful product. China is managing to place its motorcycles in the top 3 in sales even with this enormous handicap on the table. When your maintenance intervals match the rest of your competitors, the rest will be history. Image | Zontes In Xataka | Spain loves one thing: cheap motorcycles. Europe doesn’t like something else: cheap motorcycles.

China has given the green light to buy NVIDIA chips. The problem for your companies is that you will closely monitor each operation

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NVIDIA has hundreds of thousands of H200 chips trapped in limbo. It is one of the company’s most powerful chips and the standard of the companies that are training AI. It is preferred for train the modelsand also the weapon with which The United States sought to leave China out of the game. After movements by the two countries, The US finally approved (25% commission through) that NVIDIA could sell the H200 to Chinese companies. China has taken some time, but finally it seems that it will accept the offer reluctantly and with an ace up its sleeve: DeepSeek. The mess. The H200 issue is a soap opera. In the context of the trade and technology warthe United States played one of the best cards they had: preventing one of their most powerful products from reaching Chinese hands. They also hindered European companies like ASML from selling their most advanced machinery for making semiconductors to companies like Huawei or SMIC. China responded, of course. He attacked with rare earth -that control almost exclusively– and has been showing little by little that they can not only create advanced semiconductors on your own (and pushing old technology to the limit), but they are alive and well in the battle for artificial intelligence. Furthermore, they have developed a robotics industry and other aerospace practically out of nowhere, making a vacuum to Western chips, and that has caught the United States on the wrong foot. China makes a move. Seeing that China was advancing and the US was not getting a cent, they moved tab: They opened the door for NVIDIA to sell its H200s to certain Chinese customers. For each sale, the US took 25%, but it seems that it was something that the Chinese Big-Tech wanted to take on because they need, at least currently, that NVIDIA technology. And the GPU company itself increased production expecting two million orders above normal. The problem is that everything moved very quickly. without China, really, having said anything. Because here it is not just a question of whether the United States lets it sell, but whether China wants its companies to buy. In a tense calm that left requests halted and thousands of H200 in limbo, China has finally made a move. According to Reuters, and as we told a few days agothere are companies that will be able to place orders for the H200. There is a “but”. It is not carte blanche for anyone to place an order. According to WSJ, Chinese authorities have indicated that each purchase must be for a use considered “necessary.” That includes advanced research or development in AI. Because two factors come into play here: On the one hand, it seems that there are Chinese companies that are pressuring the Government to let them access the technology. NVIDIA was allowed to sell the H20 to Chinese customers, but if these customers can now buy the H200 – six times more capable – they want to take advantage of it. But China does not want everyone to throw themselves into the arms of NVIDIA because, precisely, they have been building their own semiconductor industry for five years with SMIC and Huawei in the lead. China’s goal is to stop depending on the US, and if everyone starts buying US chips like crazy, they will not advance on the technological roadmap that the country marked a long time ago. That is to say, it seems that Chinese regulators are going to evaluate which companies can or cannot buy the H200 depending on the use they want to give it. It has been reported that, for example, ByteDance, Alibaba and Tencent will be able to import 400,000 H200 chips. But there is a twist to all this. deepseek. China’s quintessential artificial intelligence model is one that has turned both NVIDIA and the United States upside down. The question was how it was possible that, without access to the latest technology, DeepSeek could optimize its AI so much. On the one hand, ingenuity to circumvent the CUDA standard. On the other hand, there are those who are clear that DeepSeek has been trained with NVIDIA cards… smuggled. Accusations of smuggling are nothing new in this commercial and technological war, but precisely, and according to Reutersthe company that joins NVIDIA’s massive H200 order along with ByteDance, Alibaba and Tencent is… DeepSeek. Officially, and without restrictions, they will be able to access the H200. “We have given China the argument to launch its own industry and, at the same time, we are giving them access to ours again” – Samuel Bresnick Whiplash. I really liked this concept that Wired uses to define American policy in this regard. They are the ones who started the conflict and their position has been pivoting about tariffsbut with more or less lax measures depending on the moment. It seems clear that, now, they are at a point where they have had to think “if China is going to somehow reach the technology, at least we sell it and earn something along the way.” Samuel Bresnick is a researcher at the Georgetown Center for Security and Technology and comments in Wired that the worst thing you can do is “come and go,” noting that “we have given China the argument to launch its own industry and, at the same time, we once again give them access to ours.” Get your batteries. And meanwhile, there’s Jensen Huang. The CEO of NVIDIA has taken a mass bath in recent days in both China and Taiwan, where he has met with some of the companies that move the semiconductor sector. NVIDIA sat at the same table, TSMCFoxconn or Asus, and Huang came out, half joking, half seriouswith one request: you need wafers and RAM. Regarding the purchase of the H200, China is walking on eggshells, and it makes perfect sense. It is at a point where it does not want to be left behind, and to do so it needs its … Read more

buy what others discard

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Primaprix had a turnover of 347 million euros in 2024, 24% more than the previous year. We know this thanks to the accounts for that year, which has just been deposited in the Commercial Registry and which has been published Five Days. In just four years it has quadrupled its income and has gone from 110 stores to almost 300. All this selling exclusively well-known brands, without a single white label product. Counterintuitive in a country where the white label has become a religion. Why is it important. The Primaprix model is exactly the opposite of the one dominates Spanish distribution. While Mercadona has been expelling manufacturer brands to fill the shelves with Hacendado and Deliplus, this chain has decided to do just the opposite: only top brands, but at bargain prices. The formula works because it buys what others discard. In detail. Primaprix feeds on the surpluses that large manufacturers need to liquidate: stocks leftovers, packaging changes, canceled promotions, failed launches… It also purchases products in countries where the price is lower (hence some labels come in other languages) and references with a close consumption date, but always within the legal margins. The result is discounts of between 25% and 40% on the usual market price. In some cases, up to 70%. The effect. This changing assortment generates a “treasure hunt” dynamic: what is on the shelves today may be gone tomorrow. And that urgency builds loyalty. The customer returns frequently because they know that there will always be something new at a good price. Similar to what happens, otherwise, with the news from Mercadona or Lidl’s central baskets. The chain has gained one million customers in the last year. It already reaches 3.3 million buyers. In Madrid it doubles the national average quota. Yes, but. The model has its limits: Relying on surpluses means not being able to guarantee continuity of assortment. There is no developed fresco section. And managing an inventory that rotates every week requires even more complicated logistics than usual in this sector. Between the lines. Primaprix has been able to read a change of era. After years of persistent inflation, buying at a outlet It has become normalized, it has gone from necessity to custom. Stiffness structural. And that is why the customer profile has diversified. It is no longer just those who arrive just at the end of the month, it is also young professionals and middle class households who enjoy finding a brand name shampoo or some snacks imported at half price. The figures: Turnover in 2024: 347 million euros. Growth: 24% year-on-year. Stores: about 300. Staff: almost 2,000 employees. Gross margin: 35%, above the largest in the sector. The context. The owner of Primaprix is ​​the Uruguayan investor John Pfeffera cryptocurrency enthusiast, through his Pfeffer Capital fund. The headquarters is in Luxembourg and also operates in France and Portugal, although the bulk of the business continues to be Spain. The original founder was Carlos Villarformer director of Dia in Brazil, who launched the chain in 2014. Twelve years later, its commitment to selling well-known brands at knockdown prices has shown that there was a huge gap in the Spanish market. One that no one else was occupying. Featured image | Primaprix In Xataka | Of course, Mercadona plans to apply AI in its supermarkets. To “sell lettuce”, specifically

We already know the best day to buy a new SSD: yesterday

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Six months ago, a Lexar NQ790 SSD with a 1 TB capacity had a price of 67.68 euros on Amazon. Today that same unit It is 139.99 euros: more than double. The worrying phenomenon that we have already seen with DRAM memories is now also beginning to be a reality in this type of storage units, but the worst is yet to come. what’s happening. At the end of 2025 we already saw how the average price of RAM memory modules had tripled or quadrupled in some cases. This component is becoming an absolute luxury for users and manufacturers not only of PCs and laptops, but also of mobile phones. AI, once again guilty. The AI ​​industry demands all production for itself, and that has made manufacturers focus on that segment for a simple reason: they make more money than ever thanks to it. The problem? that at focus on memories for AI chips and data centersthey do not have the resources to manufacture memories for the rest of the segments and of course not for end users. And what we already saw with RAM memories is now clearly seen in other components such as SSD units and also graphics cards for gamers. bad business. If you are undecided when it comes to building your PC, two messages. The first: it doesn’t surprise us. The second: if you are going to buy the components, do it as soon as possible. The catastrophe that is occurring with DRAM memories was just a prelude to what will happen with other components, and among them, SSD units are directly affected, which will soon also become a small luxury product. Price of a Lexar 790 1TB SSD on Amazon. Source: CamelCamelCamel They are already worth more than gold. What happens with the 1 TB capacity Lexar drive is almost anecdotal compared to larger capacity SSD drives. At Tom’s Hardware They made a disturbing comparison: an 8TB M.2 NVMe SSD weighs 8.2 grams on average and right now its average price is $1,476. And pay attention, because 8.2 grams of gold today costs about $1,150. 4 TB SSD units are “somewhat cheaper” than gold by weight, but even these models can be comparable if we choose one of the units with the best features. Dangerous trend. In PC Part Picker they have graphs of price tracking and the evolution of SSD unit prices is clear. As the image shows, the average price of 4TB NVMe drives is already practically 50% more than it was more than a year ago. For now, prices seem to be weathering the storm due to the inventory that was available, but as shown by the fact that the gray area already occupies almost the entire graph in recent months, those inventory units are disappearing and demand will predictably make this growing trend maintain… or skyrocket even more. Better not even talk about graphics cards. The RAM memory problem is also affecting the graphics card segment and in recent days we are seeing an important collateral effect. Some manufacturers are abandoning the manufacturing and marketing of some “more affordable” models to focus on more expensive ones. ASUS advertisement recently that it was going to stop selling its GeForce RTX 5070 Ti and the reason is simple: this card has 16GB of GDDR7 memory, which is the same as used in the RTX 5080. Why settle for selling a $749 MSRP card when you can sell a $999 one instead? If you want to buy, the sooner the better.. If you were thinking about upgrading or building a new PC, it seems clear that the best time is yesterday. The prices of memory, SSD units and graphics cards are beginning to break worrying records, and it is not likely that these increases will relax. In fact, everything indicates that they are going to get worse. Bad time for those who were hoping to renew their PC. In Xataka | The situation with RAM prices is so desperate that there are already those who build their own memory at home

inserting advertising while you buy without leaving it

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Tech giants are finding a thousand and one ways to monetize their AI tools beyond their payment plans for a reason: in a few years almost everyone will be using AI and not everyone will go through the hoop of paying for a subscription. Hence, Google has made a move in the field of purchasing items through AI. The company has announced recently the incorporation of personalized ads in its purchasing mode through its AI, one more bet to monetize its chatbot and compete directly with OpenAI and the rest of the competitors in the recent open front of AI-assisted commerce. What has changed. The company will allow advertisers to present exclusive offers to users who are about to purchase a product through Google’s AI mode, powered by its model Gemini. Vidhya Srinivasan, vice president of Google Ads and Commerce, counted through an official publication that it is “a new concept that goes beyond our traditional search ad model.” Stores may also offer discounts or free shipping at checkout. The idea is that AI assists the user in the entire purchasing process, without going through the websites. Why it is important. It’s a significant shift from the traditional model of sponsored ads in search results, which generates tens of billions of dollars for Google but has been threatened by the rise of AI chatbots. The company is leveraging its dominance in online search to position its AI model in front of billions of users. Gemini still lags behind ChatGPT in popularity, despite all its advances, so the company is looking for new goals and objectives to make Gemini a more attractive model for users. How it works. The new advertising function will use contextual information from user conversations with the chatbot to activate offers on relevant products. Our conversation with Gemini will be a succulent package of information for the AI ​​to recommend products to us while we use its shopping mode. Retailers will be able to configure the promotions they want to show, and Google will use its AI to determine the optimal time to present each offer. The company notes that it will initially focus on discounts, but plans to expand to other attributes such as bundled packages and free shipping. Its current partners include brands such as Petco, elf Cosmetics and Samsonite. The commercial career of AI. Google is not alone in this battle. Last month, OpenAI stopped press on any advertising-related topics internally after its CEO, Sam Altman, will declare a “code red” about the need to improve ChatGPT, as they mention from Financial Times. However, OpenAI already has an instant purchase feature which allows you to purchase products directly on ChatGPT, charging a commission for sales. Microsoft also presented its Copilot Checkoutstating that purchases through their chatbot generate 53% more sales in the first 30 minutes of interaction. Universal protocol and purchasing agents. In addition to personalized advertising, Google presented what it calls “Universal Commerce Protocol”, developed together with large retailers such as Walmart, Target and Shopify. This open source system aims to become a standard so that AI agents can research products and make purchases without leaving the Google platform. Chains like Kroger, Lowe’s, and Papa Johns are already testing these tools to prepare for everything to come when it comes to AI-assisted commerce. Everyone wants to participate, but not at Google’s expense. There is still the elephant in the room when we talk about buying directly from a chatbot: it is not yet a reliable tool and that can damage the store’s image. That’s why many companies are developing their own AI agents, giving them more control over how their products are displayed and delivered. The analysis firm McKinsey esteem that the AI-powered commerce market could represent a $3-$5 trillion opportunity globally by 2030. Cover image | Google and own assembly In Xataka | OpenAI fully enters health for a simple reason: ChatGPT is already our front-line doctor (although we don’t want to admit it)

no one wants to buy what’s left of it

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Telefónica has started the year by closing his withdrawal from Colombia and ends a latin american exodus which includes the departure of Argentina, Peru, Uruguay, Ecuador or Chile. There are only three markets left: Venezuela (in an uncomfortable chronic limbo), Chile (already in the final phase) and Mexico, which has resisted for six years. Brazil also remains, but it is a special case: it is the only country in the region in which Telefónica wants to maintain its presence. There it continues to grow and in fact attracts greater investment than Spain itself. Why is it important. Mexico represents the last obstacle to completing the plan’Transform & Grow‘, which concentrates the teleco’s strategy in Spain, Germany, the United Kingdom and Brazil. But the Mexican asset has mutated to become something that no one wants to buy. The context. In 2001, Telefónica arrived in Mexico with imperial ambition: “it could be the group’s second market in the world,” their managers said. It once had 26 million customers and today has 23.5 million, but its value has evaporated. Between the lines. The Mexican operation is no longer that of a traditional telecom: Telefónica sold its towers in 2019. He returned the radio spectrum. And it migrated all its traffic to the AT&T network. Today it is something much more similar to a virtual mobile operator (MVNO) that only manages a user base. Without its own infrastructure, without frequencies and without physical assets. Yes, but. That customer base, even with operating costs reduced, is not attractive either. The average income per user (ARPU) is around 70 pesos per month (3.9 dollars), with a high volume of prepaid customers and low consumption. “People more likely to receive calls than to generate them,” summarizes Ernesto Piedras, from The Competitive Intelligence Unit, in statements to The Country. AT&T doubles that ARPU. And Carlos Slim’s Telcel concentrates 66% of the market’s income. The AT&T Mexico put up for sale It further complicates the picture because any potential buyer will prefer to evaluate the US operation first rather than stay with an MVNO that depends on its networks. Telefónica is relegated to the background. The alarm signal. The Tax Administration Service (SAT) claims 4,442 million pesos (about 212 million dollars) for improper deductions after a merger in 2014. The case is in the Mexican Supreme Courtwith a full inclination to toughen fiscal positions. This liability conditions any sale. In detail. Beyond ONE, a Dubai fund that owns Virgin Mobile Mexico, seemed like the natural buyer six months ago. Telefónica valued the business at 609 million dollars. Beyond ONE offered just over half. Talks stalled over the wholesale contract with AT&T and pending tax litigation. Today that operation is frozen. Given the impossibility of selling en bloc, Telefónica has begun to cut up: Go deeper. Marc Murtra, president of Telefónica, confirmed the strategy in November, when he ratified the decision to leave Latin America. But Mexico shows that leaving a market can be more difficult than entering it. Especially when you’ve sold everything valuable and only low-power users, tax debts, and a technological dependency on your competitor remain. In Xataka | 100 years after its birth, Telefónica faces the greatest existential dilemma in its history: what does it want to be when it grows up Featured image | Telefónica, Jimmy Woo

I have tried to buy one of the 7 euro Renfe tickets. And Renfe has done Renfe’s

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January 8 in Madrid. A cold that cuts the face. Traffic jams everywhere with the children returning to school. Back to normal, to the office. To the computer. Depression. We Madrid residents need few excuses to flee the city. Perhaps that is why the Renfe discounts sounded like a swan song. Beach and paella. It almost doesn’t matter if it’s in May, April or the next weekend in January. Aware that It would be almost impossible get a ticket at that price, I missed the opportunity to avoid unwanted frustrations. Let’s try tomorrow, see if… And here I am, hooked on the Renfe website, with thousands of people ahead of me in a virtual queue that leads nowhere. I was looking for a relaxing weekend. An appetizer to put in my mouth during this return to routine. And right now I feel like I’m in line at Doña Manolita on December 21, two kilometers from the door and 20 minutes until the lottery administration closes. Seven euros (or many more) And well, here we are. I go to the Renfe website. I select the offer that promises tickets for seven euros. And we have to wait. Seven minutes and just over 3,000 people. It could be worse, I think. Much worse, in fact, because since yesterday the website has been crashing. Of course, They are not the more than 166,000 people which my colleague Javier Pastor encountered in April 2022. Then the tickets cost 15 euros and there were 100,000 seats available to buy in three days. This time Renfe The number of seats has not been made public. but it has confirmed that the reduction with seven euro bills will be active until January 18. I think that with ten days of margin, the volume of people who aspire to buy their ticket will be somewhat lower. Time, in fact, seems to be working in my favor. The minutes are falling. A little slower than what is stated on the sign above but just over 10 minutes after logging in, Renfe confirms that I have started the purchase process. According to them, it should have been on the platform for a couple of minutes. I therefore have 18 minutes left. Or I should wear them. Because I confirm that I want to access the site as soon as possible. “Yes please”. The screen refreshes. Another minute has passed. We have 17 minutes left. “Yes please”. Wow, it seems that my turn has expired despite having waited patiently and confirmed all the steps without leaving the active tab (whatever might happen). And here we are, starting the whole process again. Again seven minutes ahead and more than 3,000 people in the virtual queue. My paella is starting to choke. Again, same screen: “Yes, please” This time yes. This time it seems that I have been able to access the platform. Obviously, the tickets are not as I expected. I sail between weekends. The only seven euro tickets on a Friday are those that leave at 6:30 am. I discard that option because I have the bad habit of working on Fridays. I choose to leave on Saturday at that same time. The relaxing weekend starts with an early morning, but hey, we’ll disconnect until Sunday night. But to return on Sunday night there are no offers. Accepting that I will have to spend more than 14 euros to go and return, I stretch the gum to the maximum. I tell myself “I’ll take Friday off on vacation but I’ll take full advantage of the weekend.” I’m going to June. I select departure at seven euros at 6:30 in the morning. But dynamic prices have done their thing. Returning on Sunday at the last minute will cost me over 60 euros. There are no longer even weekends at bargain prices. And assuming that hotels will be much more expensive, I return to the month of January. I think that going for seven euros and returning for 35 euros from Valencia is not bad at all. I have already taken the bait of compulsive buying and I’m not willing to let go. I select the departure on Saturday at 6:30 in the morning. I eat that paella. I select the return after 9:00 p.m. I’ll see what I do until that time, Alberto’s problem from the future. Mech. Mistake. Yes, I have selected the one-way ticket but Renfe tells me no. I refresh and go back. I select the idea again. I select the return. Now, I go one step further. It remains to fill in the traveler’s information and pay. I would like to do it but At this point the website freezes. It starts to malfunction. The scrolling is jerky and it is impossible to press any button. I can’t fill out the form. It won’t let me change the email. Of course, it doesn’t let me go to the payment platform. Soda. I have 4245 people in front of me. Photos | Renfe and Xataka In Xataka | Renfe is obliged to compensate for delays of more than 15 minutes starting January 1. The Government wants to prevent it

lend money to those who buy them

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The European automobile sector is experiencing its worst crisis in decades as a result of a perfect storm: This alignment has led the six main European manufacturers to project a drop in sales by 2025. But there is a parallel business that is growing: banking. Why is it important. Volkswagen, BMW and Mercedes have turned their financial divisions into the engine that is making their profits grow. It is no longer just about selling cars, but about financing their purchase. From there its benefits come to an increasing extent. The figures. As detailed The Economist Based on the financial results of different manufacturers, at Volkswagen financial services have contributed 3,096 million euros of Ebitda in the first nine months of 2024. It is 44% of the total, more than the sale of vehicles to passengers and companies combined. A business that grows 7.9% while the rest contracts. BMW places its financial division at 20% of the total business, with 38,562 million euros invoiced. In the third quarter that weight grew to 29.7%. Mercedes reaches 13.4% of its income through this means. Renault 12.5%, with a growth of 19.8% in the last quarter according to the analysis of results collected by the financial media. Between the lines. Automobile companies have built banks within their structures. The logic is simple: deposits provide cheaper financing than issuing debt in the markets. They offer loans, leasing and vehicle subscriptions with margins that the traditional business no longer provides. Yes, but. This model brings systemic risks. During the 2008 crisis, GMAC (the financial division of General Motors) collapsed due to its exposure to mortgages subprime and needed a bailout of $17.2 billion. Mixing banking and sales multiplies the risk when a recession hits. Furthermore, this is not an exclusively Spanish or European phenomenon. How to collect Washington Postthe US FDIC has received applications from GM, Stellantis and Ford to create industrial banks. Trump promised to relax business restrictions, and approving them would set a precedent for technology companies like Apple, Google or Amazon, which have been rumored to make similar moves for decades. The paradox. Automobile companies are mutating towards a model where the car is the pretext and credit is the business. They sell cars to be able to lend money and thus reverse the logic of an industry that defined the 20th century. The question is whether this shift is going to save them or whether it will end up exposing them to a new financial crisis. In Xataka | The car market in Spain in 2025 confirms the trend: the three winners while electrification gains weight Featured image | Lenny Kuhne

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