Over its entire 2022 financial year, the leading Spanish bank, with a strong presence in Europe and Latin America, earned 9.6 billion euros in net profit, an increase of 18% compared to 2021.

This result, achieved thanks to a solid last quarter (2.29 billion net profits), is higher than the forecasts of analysts polled by Factset, who expected an average of 9.1 billion.

"2022 has again been a very good year for Santander", welcomed the group's president, Ana Botin, on Thursday, boasting at a press conference of a "very solid balance sheet", in a context of "uncertainty "caused by the war in Ukraine.

The profit made last year is in fact the largest in the history of the bank: the previous record (9.06 billion euros) dated "from 2007", i.e. before the financial crisis of 2008, specified a Santander spokesman to AFP.

160 million customers

These results - published the day after the announcement by BBVA, the country's second bank, of a record profit of 6.42 billion - were favorably received on the Madrid Stock Exchange, where Santander gained 6.4% at 2:00 p.m. (1:00 p.m. GMT) in a rising market (+1.6%).

The Spanish group explains them by the dynamism of its main markets, particularly in the euro zone and the United Kingdom, where the increases in interest rates decided by the central banks to curb inflation have boosted its income.

Its net banking income, equivalent to its turnover, thus increased by 16% last year, to reach 38.6 billion euros – a figure in line with expectations.

This strong commercial momentum was also supported by the arrival of seven million new customers, bringing the total number of Santander customers worldwide to 160 million, of which 51 million have subscribed to its online services.

The bank suggests a solid financial year again in 2023, “with a double-digit revenue growth target”, despite the deterioration of the global economy and the “inflation-related cost increase”, underlines Santander.

Exceptional tax

Due to the good results garnered last year, the group specifies that it will increase the remuneration of its shareholders to 40% of its net profit, distributed “in equal parts” between dividends and share buybacks.

This announcement comes in the midst of a debate on the surge in bank profits, which the Spanish leftist government has planned to subject to an exceptional tax in 2023 and 2024 in order to finance its measures to support purchasing power.

Banks "increase their profits" while individuals find themselves "stuck" by rising rates, but "don't you dare say that Santander and Ana Botin is ruthless capitalism", quipped Thursday Pablo Echenique, one of the leaders of the radical left party Podemos, partner of the socialists in the Spanish government.

This tax, against which the banks have ceased to scrap in recent months, will be paid by a dozen of them and will allow the State to recover 1.5 billion euros in 2023 as in 2024.

Asked at a press conference, Ana Botin estimated between 220 and 230 million euros the impact of this measure for Santander in 2023, specifying that the group was still in the process of "evaluating" a possible legal action against this levy. .

“We agree with the fact that governments collect” taxes, but “everyone must pay”, because “banks already pay five points” of taxes more “than other companies”, has she pointed out, adding that Santander spent "a third" of its profits on taxes.

The 2022 results could also rekindle the debate over the distribution of profits within the banking group, with one of Spain's main unions, the UGT, demanding for several weeks wage increases for employees.

© 2023 AFP