MADRID: A Spanish court on Tuesday acquitted former IMF chief Rodrigo Rato and all other defendants of fraud and falsifying the books during the 2011 flotation of Spain's Bankia, a symbol of the country's banking crisis.

Presented as a prosperous business, Bankia's listing was very popular with small investors who rushed to buy share packages, only to see their savings disappear when the bank teetered on the edge of bankruptcy just one year later.

The National Court, which handles major criminal cases, had been tasked with deciding whether Rato and other defendants had knowingly deceived investors into buying shares by presenting a misleading image of the bank.

But it concluded Bankia's stock listing had received approvals "from all necessary institutions".

The state was forced to nationalise the bank and inject 22 billion euros ($25.7 billion) in 2012 to keep it from collapsing at a time when the Spanish economy was mired in crisis.