The scope of action of SEPI covers 14 majority-owned companies, 10 minority-owned companies, and 100 companies in which it has an indirect participation
Who we are
The Spanish state-owned industrial holding company Sociedad Estatal de Participaciones Industriales (SEPI) constitutes a strategic tool for implementing the policy designed by the Government for the state-owned corporate sector.
Its mission consists in making corporate shareholdings profitable and focusing all actions on looking after the public interest. In this way, SEPI’s management must combine financial profitability with social profitability.
A public law entity
SEPI is a public law entity. It operates in accordance with private law, although some public law norms apply to it, such as the one, among others, which results from the Budgetary General Law, the Law on Public Sector Procurements, or the Budgetary Laws. SEPI is attached to the Ministry of Finance.
This Company was born in 1995, through Royal Law Decree 5/1995, of June 16th, later passed as Law 5/1996, of January 10th, 1996 about the Setup of certain Public Law Entities.
Grupo SEPI
The scope of the activity spans 14 companies in which there is a direct and majority participation, and which make up Grupo SEPI, with a workforce of more than 85,000 people; it is also a shareholder in Corporación RTVE, has got a public foundation, and direct and minority participations in a further 10 companies, and indirect ones in more than 100.
The Solvency Support Fund for Strategic Companies (FASEE in Spanish)
The Solvency Support Fund for Strategic Companies (FASEE in Spanish) was set up by Royal Law-Decree 25/2020, on July 3rd, on urgent measures for supporting economic activity and employment, providing temporary support to feasible companies in strategic industries affected by the pandemic. The deadline for submitting requests ended on June 30th, according to the sixth modification of the Temporary Framework about the state aid measures earmarked to supporting the economy because of the COVID-19.
General State Budgets
SEPI and the companies in which it has a direct and majority participation can receive contributions from the General State Budgets, as well as raise funds on the Spanish or the international markets, through the issue and placement of fixed-interest securities, which will benefit from the guarantee of the State against third parties.
The changes introduced in 2006 in Law 5/1996 regarding the Establishment of certain Public Law Entities and in Royal Law Decree 15/1997, which concern SEPI, modified the financial regime of this state-owned company and that of its affiliates, with the aim of adapting it, in full compliance with Community Law, to a new corporate stage in which it was no longer possible to keep the principle of budgetary autonomy under which it was created.
Public control of the State and of the EU
The fact that it belongs to the public sector means that SEPI and its companies are subject to the same control procedures than any other public institution:
- Economic and financial control, through the Office of the General State Comptroller (IGAE) and the Court of Auditors.
- Control of working terms and conditions, by the Commission for the Follow-Up of Collective Bargaining, the Inter-Ministerial Committee on Remunerations (CECIR), and the Ministry of Finance.
- Specific controls regarding privatizations, by the Consultative Board for Privatizations, the Office of the General State Comptroller, and the Court of Auditors.
- Parliament control, through informative appearances in the Lower and the Higher Houses of Parliament, parliamentarian initiatives, and the periodical submission of political and financial information.
- Control by the European Union, through the Community bodies regarding competition and industrial policies.