Héctor Grisi, a man "with experience" to build bridges and leave Orcel's ghost behind

• Banca Santander will appoint Héctor Grisi as CEO to replace José Antonio Álvarez

"He has extensive experience and knows the business very well. He has a long professional career, with a great focus on the client and a proven ability to lead transformation processes and connectivity between the group's markets," Banco Santander argues in this way. election of

as the new CEO of the entity from next January 1, replacing

.

"He is the ideal person to lead the Group together with the president, Ana Botín", added Bruce Carnegie Brown, the chairman of the council's appointments committee that has been in charge of his final election.

This cleared

that has flown over the entity in recent months, when Álvarez's replacement has been accelerated.

The company had been considering names to command the new stage for some time and the pressure was not low after the failure and subsequent lawsuit over the frustrated signing of

.

There have been candidates from outside and inside the entity on the table and finally they have ended up betting on an internal profile that has been in the group for several years and that will allow it to build bridges across the Atlantic to add synergies.

Grisi joined the group in 2015 as CEO of Santander Mexico and in these years has promoted a great transformation of the business;

however, his professional career spans more than 35 years.

Before joining the Cantabrian entity, the Mexican worked for 18 years at Credit Suisse, where he held different positions of responsibility, including director of investment banking for Mexico, Central America and the Caribbean and later general manager and director delegate of Credit Suisse Mexico.

He studied in Mexico and Canada, and has a degree in Finance from the Universidad Iberoamericana.

Ana Botín has highlighted his leadership, teamwork and his ability to create value for clients and shareholders.

said the president in the statement released by the entity this Friday, and has appealed to his results over the years as an endorsement of the decision.

"His excellent results as CEO of Santander Mexico and head of North America speak for themselves and are the best example of why the board has chosen him to lead the bank in this new phase of growth and transformation."

During his years at Santander Mexico, Grisi has driven the transformation of the business, which has placed the return on ordinary tangible common equity at 31% at the end of March 2022, increasing the number of active clients by almost 50%, up to close to 10 million, and doubling the number of linked customers.

In addition, it has placed the entity among the

companies, mortgages and project finance (

).

In 2019, he was appointed regional manager for North America, whose main markets are Mexico and the United States.

In 2021, the United States achieved the

with a profit of 2,750 million dollars, compared to 648 million in 2018, and became the country that contributed the most to the Group's profit.

Also under his leadership, connectivity between the region's markets has increased, which has enabled it to take advantage of cross-border business opportunities, improve efficiency, and advance the bank's goal of building a common operating model ("One Santander").

As a result, the region has almost doubled its profit since 2019.

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