After years of strong growth and business expansion, Spain's mutual saving banks (cajas de ahorro) face a challenging future in a very competitive market as the Spanish economy slows down. With one of their main business lines, the provision of mortgage loans in deep trouble, the buzzword among the cajas is to diversify to ride out the storm. The cajas have been feeling the pinch of an economy that has moved swiftly from posting some the fastest rates of growth in the EU to becoming one of the bloc's most sluggish laggards. Earnings in the first quarter reflected the uncertainties facing the sector. As a whole in Q1, the cajas posted a paltry 0.2% increase in net profits, a far cry from the 19.2% posted in the whole of 2007.
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机译：经过多年的强劲增长和业务扩展，随着西班牙经济放缓，西班牙的共同储蓄银行（cajas de ahorro）在竞争激烈的市场中面临着充满挑战的未来。凭借其主要业务之一，即深陷困境的抵押贷款的提供，卡萨斯人的流行语是多元化以渡过难关。卡萨斯人一直感觉到经济的紧迫感，它已经从公布欧盟最快的一些增长率迅速转变为成为欧盟最迟钝的落后者之一。第一季度收益反映了该行业面临的不确定性。总体而言，第一季度的净利润仅增长了微不足道的0.2％，与2007年全年的19.2％相去甚远。
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