Oliu (Sabadell): “We were convinced that there would be a second takeover bid and it didn’t happen”
Josep Oliu, president of Banco Sabadell, addresses the issue of the financial system in the face of market challenges, a few days after the failure of BBVA’s takeover bid to take over the entity.
“What we have not done well in this takeover bid is that in the last three days we were convinced that there would be a second takeover bid and it did not happen. We wasted time for three days,” he said.
“In the value part, we looked at what alternatives we had to show that Banco de Sabadell had more value than they wanted to give us to make us disappear as an independent entity. The bank went from a perspective of sustainable value creation of around one billion to a perspective of 2,000 million,” he said.
“Lessons from the takeover that I have learned: first, that I will never carry out any hostile takeover,” he says.
The president of Banco Sabadell has indicated that the entity has promised the market a significant dividend distribution, so this will be its objective, and not to grow through purchases, only through organic growth. The entity will focus on “profitability, capital generation and the distribution of excess capital.” In the next two or three years “our focus is not going to be increasing size.” And he added: “If there is more capital, we will also distribute it through share repurchase.” He added that the risk of Sabadell not distributing the promised dividends “is practically zero.” “The bank is very solid, as is the economy. The risk of executing Sabadell’s strategy alone is zero. The risk of dividends not being given is practically zero.”
Oliu has insisted that the movements are not “necessarily mergers”, not even cross-border, since a Spanish bank “has its way of acting in Spain, and an Italian in Italy”. But there are platforms that, due to their size and innovation costs, “can operate internationally.” And he has given the example of payment platforms. “We are awaiting an international alliance with a payment platform, the same as in Italy and France.” “We are a customer bank that distributes products from different platforms”
For Oliu, technological innovation “is not going to occur in banks,” but will come from technology companies. “They are in charge of creating technologies to make banks competitive”
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