BANKER
His University Studies
Although he would have liked to have been a writer or journalist devoted exclusively to banking, Luis Valls was a Doctor of Law. He studied law at the Faculty of Law of the University of Barcelona and graduated with good grades, even earning distinctions. Upon joining Opus Dei at the age of 20, when he became aware of his vocation, he simultaneously pursued his university studies and studied Dogmatic Theology and related disciplines; he never interrupted there. During his university years, he had to do fulfill his military service, and he chose the university military service. Gonzalo Fernández de la Mora 1 mentioned in a profile that he wrote about Luis Valls, “he completed the summer camps with excellent grades and was appointed as a reserve Infantry lieutenant in the mixed regiment of Tarragona” (see annex).
Doctoral Thesis
He graduated in Barcelona in 1948 and, a year later, moved to Madrid to pursue his doctorate. He lived in the Colegio Mayor Moncloa and spent four years working in various libraries on his thesis, “The Assignment of Contracts in Spanish Law,” dedicated to his father and presented in 1952. He received the highest grade and the honor of having it published (it was published in 1955). By then, Valls had already changed direction, realizing that law was not his true calling. He was already immersed in the daily operations of Banco Popular, where he started in 1953, introduced by his uncle, Felix Millet.
Beginning His Professional Life
In any event, his legal studies did not go to waste. Quite the opposite, according to Ángel Ron2 , who would later succeed him as President of the Bank: “His solid legal training influenced his character, giving him a pragmatism that always allowed him to see beyond.” As for his thesis, despite being on a technical-legal subject, it was nonetheless related to the banking activity that would later occupy the rest of his life. From now on, we can begin to talk about the beginning of his professional career.
Bibliography
(1) Profile written by Gonzalo Fernández de la Mora for the Fundación FUNDER to be published in an anthology of 20th-century Spanish bankers (in fact never published).
(2) Prologue to the book History of Banco Popular. The Struggle for Independence (Gabriel Tortella, José María Ortiz-Villajos, and José Luis García Ruiz. Marcial Pons, 2011).
