/cloudfront-us-east-2.images.arcpublishing.com/reuters/CM4ET2R4WFLP7GE5EAHPUENQYU.jpg)
Ana Patricia Botin, chairwoman of the Spanish bank Santander, speaks during the annual results presentation at the company’s headquarters in Boadilla del Monte, outside Madrid, Spain, February 2, 2023. REUTERS/Violeta Santos Moura Acquire Licensing Rights
NEW YORK, Nov 9 (Reuters) – Banco Santander Executive Chair Ana Botin plans to deepen the lender’s corporate banking presence in the United States in renewable finance, auto lending and wealth as part of a broader strategy to diversify revenues by expanding in the world’s biggest economy.
“Our strategy is very focused on playing to our strengths,” she said in an interview at the Reuters NEXT conference in New York. “We will do better than our peers in a normalized interest-rate environment.”
Spain’s biggest bank is trying to double its business in U.S. investment banking, despite recent results being hit by loan losses, higher funding costs and expenses from the efforts to scale up.
Net profit in the United States fell 50% year-on-year in the third quarter, the bank reported last month, while net interest income, the difference between earnings on loans minus deposit costs, fell 15%.
Provisions rose 49% in the quarter against the same period a year ago.
As part of its efforts to grow the unit, the Spanish bank is hiring staff from the stricken Credit Suisse, with Reuters reporting in July that Santander was planning to hire around 150 bankers primarily in the United States.
To view the live broadcast of the World Stage go to the Reuters NEXT news page: https://www.reuters.com/world/reuters-next/
Reporting by Alessandra Galloni; Writing by Lananh Nguyen, Saeed Azhar, Lawrence White; Editing by Mark Porter and Lisa Shumaker
Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.