Afternoon of emotions and gestures in one of the industrial hearts of Catalonia, Sabadell, who has hosted a bank board again that bears his name, after the eight -year exile to Alicante. The conclave has begun with the projection of an emotional video with an orchestra and a choir interpreting the Hymn to joy from Beethoven in Sant Roc’s Square, historical headquarters of the entity. “For pride, for belonging,” the filming ends. The first board after the return home, the last ordinary one alone?
The public acquisition of shares (OPA) hostile launched almost eleven months ago by BBVA has flown over the entire Board, which has had just over 70% of the share capital represented.
OLIU has opened the meeting by pointing out the two reasons that have made 2024 have been a “very special” exercise: one is the achievement of record results that have raised the profitability of the capital tangible to 14.9%. The second is the BBVA OPA.
On the first issue, the CEO of Banco Catalán, César González-Bueno, has deepened the main magnitudes of the bank’s results account. Not only from the 2024 exercise (with a historical benefit of 1,827 million euros), it has also taken breast for its management at the head of the entity since it was incorporated in 2021.
“In 2020, the benefit was 2 million, after dedicating almost 2.3 billion to provisions and sanitizing the bank. In 2021 a new management team was incorporated, a new organizational structure was implemented by business and a new strategic plan was launched. Since that year, our action has been revalued 837%, being number one of the Ibex 35 and number one between European banks. Since then, we have executed the strategy in a rule It has clearly paid off.
It has also recognized Oliu, remembering that, at the end of 2024, the bank has positioned itself as one of the most solvent entities of the Spanish financial system. “This situation is not the same as in 2020, when a possible fusion with BBVA was studied,” he recalled.
Back to the OPA, the star issue of the Board, Oliu has reiterated -this time before the shareholders -that the operation only makes sense with merger, that the integration would raise “serious problems for the competition”, and that the offer does not generate value for the shareholders. After ten months of the process, the reality is that “the price achieved by the bank is substantially higher than the value offered by BBVA,” he said.
Sabadell’s shares closed this Thursday at 2.74 euros, an assessment that exceeds 2,134 euros that its competitor proposed in the exchange when it launched the OPA.
The president of Sabadell has also appealed to the emotional factor, to the purpose of the bank: “The mission of Banco Sabadell is to help companies turn their dreams into business realities that create value for themselves and for the whole society. Banco Sabadell has done so since its history began, 144 years ago, being today one of the best consolidated financial entities in the offer of the Spanish financial system.”
The banker has also launched a message to the shareholders of the BBVA, an entity that celebrates its Board this Friday. “Both for Banco Sabadell’s shareholders, who are being offered to be BBVA shareholders, and for shareholders that are already BBVA, I think it generates more value to maintain the projects of both banks independently,” said an excited Oliu, who has received a long two -minute applause.
For their part, the delegates of the five unions with representation in the bank have denounced the entity’s human resources policy because, in their opinion, the benefits with workers who, to achieve them, work with a lot of “pressure” do not distribute enough.
The Board has approved all the points of the agenda subjected to a vote, the most prominent of which is the distribution of 3,300 million euros in dividends charged to the results of 2024 and 2025.
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