Spanish banker Blesa found dead in midst of credit card investigation

Infamous Spanish banking executive Miguel Blesa has been found dead at a hunting lodge in the country while an investigation into his part in a credit card scandal was ongoing.

Blesa and former IMF chief Rodrigo Rato, as well as a host of other top executives, were sentenced to prison after being accused of spending €12m on so-called "black" credit cards between 2003 and 2012.

The former head of savings bank Caja Madrid’s body was found with a shotgun wound to the chest while on a hunting trip in the Córdoba area of southern Spain on Wednesday morning.

According to a report from Spanish newspaper El País, Blesa told friends he was going to move his car after having breakfast in the lodge.

Blesa and Rato came to be known as the biggest symbols of the excesses associated with Spanish bankers leading up to the recession.

Caja Madrid was one of six small Spanish savings banks which merged to form Bankia in 2012, with Blesa spending €436,700 on his credit card on wine and lavish dinners.

The banking executive had appealed his six-year sentence and the Spanish court system was investigating his appeal at the time of his death.

Blesa also caused controversy in 2013 when photographs emerged of him posing with animals he had conquered on hunting expeditions, at a time when Spain was attempting to escape a crippling recession and mass unemployment.