Madrid (EFE).- The Spanish banks that have presented their quarterly accounts in recent days have been very clear: at the moment they have no intention of paying interest to their clients for the deposits they hold, at least generally, because they do not they need to attract more liquidity to their balance sheets.
However, all of them are already benefiting from the increase in the price of money in the euro area -currently at 3.5%- and not only through the reviews of variable mortgages, but also of the rest of the credits and commissions they charge, which has translated into substantial increases in revenue.
The rise in interest rates also makes it more difficult for customers to access increasingly expensive credit, which will help increase liquidity in the system, according to the banks, which are already noticing how demand is cooling. both individuals and companies.
The “tax” reduced the benefit of the sector
The only thing that has overshadowed the quarterly accounts has been the extraordinary and temporary tax established by the Government to tax the income of the sector, which has reduced profits and which almost all have already challenged, amid allegations of injustice and accusations against the Executive of having a “confiscatory” attitude.
Bankinter was the first bank to reveal its figures, on April 20, which produced a net profit of 185 million euros, the best quarterly result in its history and 20% higher than a year ago, despite the 77 million that he had to allocate to the tax.
The CEO, María Dolores Dancausa, as clear as ever, said that in her opinion the time has not yet come to remunerate the deposits of her clients and that, until then, they will do so, as they have been doing, based on the relationship that have everyone with the bank.
Next, Santander reported on April 25 a quarterly profit of 2,571 million euros, 1% more, after paying 224 million for the extraordinary tax, without which it would have earned 2,795 million, 10% more.
Next was BBVA, on April 27, which obtained an attributable net profit of 1,846 million euros, 39.4% more than a year earlier, thanks to the higher income achieved and despite the 225 million that it allocated to pay of said rate.
On the same day, Banco Sabadell announced a quarterly net profit of 205 million euros, 4% less than in the same period of 2022, after allocating 157 million to the payment of the extraordinary tax on banks.
The only one of these entities that has not yet published its quarterly accounts is CaixaBank, which will do so next Friday, May 5, but the forecast of the market consensus is that the profit could be reduced by 4.5% compared to that achieved a year before and remain at 675 million.
Few requests to benefit from the code of good practices
Banks are currently not receiving many requests from customers with loan repayment problems to take advantage of the recently improved code of practice and review or restructure their debt.
For example, Santander has received, so far, about 1,400 requests, while Sabadell handles about 1,000; BBVA reports a “very low” figure and amount and Bankinter says it has received “very few”, given the “high socioeconomic level of its customers”.