Defaults in consumer credit have once again experienced an upturn that puts banks on their guard. There are several portfolios of doubtful loans on the market to reduce the NPL ratio, which has once again exceeded 7% and has reached the highest level in eight years.

This is shown by the latest data from the Bank of Spain on doubtful loans in financial credit establishments (EFC), which go up to April. These institutions specialise in consumer credit. Although not all consumer credit is in this niche – some banks channel it without CFCs – it is the best approximation for assessing the trend and health of the segment.

Since the covid crisis, the delinquency rate of SCIs has been on an upward trend, although it is gradually experiencing a significant decline, which can be explained by the sale of doubtful portfolios by these institutions to opportunistic funds that buy unpaid loans at a discount. In this case, the discount applied can exceed 90%.

The latest statistics point to a new increase in non-performing consumer loans, up to €3,060 million, compared with €2,852 million in the same month of the previous year. There has been a year-on-year increase of 7.3%, and the NPL ratio has risen to 7.18%, the highest level since May 2016.

On several occasions over the past four years, NPLs have touched 7%, but have always been reduced afterwards by the loan drain. On this occasion, the increase in NPLs can be explained both by the rise in NPLs and by the fall in the total volume of outstanding credit of SCIs, which acts as the denominator, and which fell by €1,111 million between March and April, to €42,638 million.

The Bank of Spain has observed this further deterioration in consumer credit quality, although it is not alarming. As the deputy governor and acting governor, Margarita Delgado, pointed out at the APIE forum in Santander, there has been an 8% increase in loans under special surveillance in consumer lending.

 Consumer credit is always the first warning sign of a possible worsening of the stock of loans on banks’ balance sheets, as households always default sooner, in case of need, on a contract of this type than on a mortgage. These are loans with higher rates and without collateral.

In the banking balance sheet as a whole, the overall NPL ratio remains contained, and in April stood at 3.6%, with a volume of non-performing loans of €42,141 million, compared with a total outstanding stock of €1.17 trillion.

Original Story: El Confidencial | Author: Óscar Giménez
Edition and Translation: Prime Yield

The banks are facing a scenario of high interest rates in Spain with limited defaults, thanks to a good response from customers who are paying their debts and the transfer of the riskiest loans to non-regulated financial institutions. They sell them at a discount, but in return they get rid of some uncertainty and keep their balance sheet in check.

Last year, €17.7 billion worth of non-performing loans (NPLs) were sold in Spain, according to a report published today by Axis Corporate. The activity has been revived amid rising interest rates.

Of this amount, €8.2 billion was raised by traditional banks. There were two major transactions outside this regulated circuit: the sale of a €6 billion portfolio by the Norwegian multinational specialising in debt collection, Axactor, and the sale of a €2 billion portfolio owned by Blackstone and transferred to Cerberus.

Sareb, Santander and BBVA, among the most active

Within the regulated entities, Sareb – owned by the State through the Frob and several banks – sold NPLs to Axactor for 3 billion, integrated in a portfolio of NPLs called Victoria.

Other portfolio sales were carried out by Deutsche Bank to Cerberus for €1.6 billion and by Santander to several firms in four transactions for €1,707 million.

BBVA made three divestments for €830 million. These were, on the one hand, the Artemis portfolio, transferred to KKR, and, on the other, the Nairobi portfolio, which went to Cerberus and Kruk.

CaixaBank made two transactions valued at €645 million, one with Link and the other with Kruk, to divest a portfolio called Twister. Goldman Sachs sold a 350 million portfolio in Spain to Bank of America.

What is the distressed debt firm, as this type of company dedicated to problem assets is known, that has bought the most doubtful portfolios from banks? It is the US fund Cerberus, which has acquired portfolios valued at €4.51 billion.

Part of the result of all these movements is the low NPL ratio exhibited by Spanish banks. Santander, BBVA and Sabadell report ratios of between 3% and 3.5%, while CaixaBank, which is the most popular among retail customers in Spain, puts it below at 2.7%.

There are two banks in Spain, Ibercaja and Kutxabank, which have managed to bring their NPL ratio below 2%. The former stands at 1.6% and the latter at 1.2%.

Doubtful loans on banks’ balance sheets have fallen in Spain from 3.7% in 2022 to 2.75% in the second quarter of 2023, despite rate hikes and the fact that the unemployment rate is still the highest in Europe.

Original Story: La Vanguardia | Author: Iñaki de las Heras
Edition and translation: Prime Yield

Bankinter is looking to sell several loan packages collectively valued at around €550 million, joining other Spanish banks that are also shedding assets in an effort to lighten their balance sheets in the face of potential financial problems stemming from high interest rates.

Specifically, the Madrid-based bank is seeking buyers for a portfolio of non-performing loans (NPL) with a face value of more than €500 million and two smaller portfolios of NPL, people familiar with the matter told Bloomberg on condition of anonymity. The same sources added that Bankinter expects to complete the sale by the third quarter. According to the US agency, a Bankinter spokesman declined to comment on the deal.

Spanish banks are trying to shed billions in loans as higher interest rates threaten to take a toll on the economy and push more people into default. CaixaBank is also in the market with portfolios valued at around €1.1 billion, while BBVA sold a €500 million package last year.

Bankinter’s proposed deals are part of its ‘minimum NPL ratio strategy’ and are ‘a top priority’ this year, according to a marketing document accessed by Bloomberg. The large portfolio Bankinter is trying to sell consists of loans to 50,000 former credit card holders, according to the marketing document.

Bankinter’s consumer finance unit had a total of €4.7 billion in loans outstanding at the end of the first quarter, of which €1 billion was granted through debit and credit cards, according to a presentation to investors.

The second portfolio marketed by Bankinter contains mortgages secured by individuals and small businesses, and the third is made up of mortgages linked to multicurrency loans, some of which carry potential legal issues, according to the document seen by Bloomberg. The two packages have a combined face value of about €40 million.

Bankinter faces claims for its multicurrency loans that could cost it as much as €146 million, according to an estimate in its latest annual report. The bank has also made provisions of €77 million for legal proceedings for ‘usurious interest rates’ through its revolving credit cards and consumer loans.

Original Story: Cinco Dias | Author: Bloomberg
Edition and translation: Prime Yield

Banco Santander has sold one of its most anticipated projects to JP Morgan. This is the Zeta project, which consists of loans to large clients in the hotel sector. The US company will pay around 200 million. The operation was carried out at a discount of one third, as the perimeter of the loans was worth 300 million.

According to El Confidencial, the Spanish group is thus removing the loans granted to hotels from its balance sheet. Although they are now up to date with their payments, they have all been in arrears for more than 90 days. In this way, it avoids future provisions on these loans and the need to deal with defaults.

Santander was advised by EY and A&O Shearman, while JP Morgan was advised by Colliers and Linklaters. Other funds such as Apollo, Starwood and Spanish group SVP also showed interest during the process. Santander’s NPL ratio stood at 3% in March 2024, down 19 basis points from a year earlier. The coverage ratio (provisions to NPLs) was 49.8%.

Santander also overtook BNP as the most capitalised bank in the European Union. This milestone came about because BNP Paribas’ share price on Tuesday discounted the dividend it will pay in the near future. When shares are quoted ex-dividend, there is always a downward adjustment in their value.

Original Story: El Confidencial | Author: Óscar Giménez
Edition and translation: Prime Yield  

CaixaBank SA is exploring the sale of €1.1 billion in non-performing loans (NPL) as it seeks to improve its asset quality

The Spanish lender is marketing two NPL portfolios that have already attracted potential bidders, according to documents seen by Bloomberg and people familiar with the matter. One is code named Oxygen and it has an outstanding balance of €610 million on about 7,000 unpaid mortgages. The other one, dubbed Cobalto, is comprised of about €500 million in unsecured loans to small and medium-sized businesses and consumers, the people said asking not to be named discussing private information.

A spokesperson declined to comment.

CaixaBank, Spain’s third-biggest lender, is taking the step to improve the health of its balance sheet, the people said. The bank has promised investors to keep its NPL ratio — a key metric of asset quality — below 3% this year.

The bank’s NPL ratio rose to 2.81%, or €10.8 billion, at the end of March, marking the second consecutive quarterly gain. The two increases were the first since CaixaBank bought rival Bankia over three years ago, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.

The increase partly happened because CaixaBank started applying “stricter criteria for the classification of non-performing loans within the prudential framework, thanks to rigorous and prudent management of credit risk,” it said in its earnings release last week. The metric is still “below the sector average,” it said.

CaixaBank has previously used disposals of NPL portfolios to clean up its balance sheet. Six years ago, it sold a real estate portfolio valued at €7 billion to Lone Star Funds.

Original Story: Yahoo Finance | Author: Bloomberg
Edition: Prime Yield

Spain’s bad bank Sareb (Sociedad de Gestión de Activos procedentes de la Banca), has sold a portfolio of non-performing loans (NPL) without associated mortgage guarantees, valued at €1.5 billion, to the Norwegian fund Axactor, which specialises in this type of operation.

As confirmed to EFE by Sareb sources, who did not disclose the proceeds of this operation, this is the second portfolio that the company has sold to this company, after transferring another one last year valued at €3 billion.

These are loans granted by the former savings banks to property developers, which remained unpaid when these companies went bankrupt and which are difficult to sell because they are not backed by any property or mortgage guarantee.

For this reason, the company has opted to package them in order to facilitate their purchase by this type of fund, which specialises in their recovery.

Sareb, which was created in 2012 to manage and sell the troubled assets of the former savings banks that received public aid, lost €2.198 billion in 2023, 46% more than in the previous year, due to capital losses on the assets sold, i.e. the differences between the book value of the assets and the selling price, and the increase in financial expenses.

However, the company managed to increase its income by 16%, to €2.748 billion, and to repay more than €1 billion euros of its debt, to around €29 billion at the end of 2023.

Original Story: Investing
Edition and translation: Prime Yield

CaixaBank Group posted an attributable net profit of €1.01 billion in the first quarter of 2024, up +17.5% vs. the €855 million registered in the same period of 2023, as it leverages its financial and commercial strength, which has allowed it to continue supporting families and businesses.

The NPL ratio was virtually unchanged in the quarter and below the sector average, at 2.8% (compared to 2.7% in December 2023) after applying stricter criteria for the classification of non-performing loans (NPL) within the prudential framework, thanks to rigorous and prudent management of credit risk. NPL increased slightly to €10.79 billion, with no discernible signs of deterioration in the organic evolution of credit exposures. Provisions for insolvency risk (€7.67 billion) brought the coverage ratio to 71%. Meanwhile, the cost of risk (trailing 12 months) remained low at 0.29%.

CaixaBank Group also has an optimal liquidity position, with €157.02 billion, and the Liquidity Coverage Ratio (LCR) stood at 197% as of 31 March, well above the regulatory minimum requirement of 100%.

As for the Group’s capital position, the CET1 capital ratio stood at 12.3% following the impact of the new €500 million share buyback programme that began in March (-22 bps) and which has now been fully deducted. On the other side, the solid organic capital generation in the first quarter stands out (+36 bps).

CaixaBank Group serves 20.1 million customers through a network of over 4,100 branches across Spain and Portugal and has more than €600 billion in assets.

Gonzalo Gortazar, CaixaBank’s CEO, has highlighted that “in the context of a resilient Spanish economy, at CaixaBank, we started 2024 with intense commercial activity and market share gains, while maintaining solid levels of profitability and efficiency”.

The CEO has underscored that “in these first three months of the year, CaixaBank has registered €1.13 billion in taxes, a figure that exceeds the profit obtained in the period. Out of those, €493 million correspond to the banking tax, 32% more than last year”.

Evolution of the income statement
CaixaBank’s income statement for the first quarter of 2024 with growth in all margins, reflects the strength of the bank and its positive business dynamics, with higher loan production and positive net inflows into wealth management products, in a context of interest rate normalisation.
As a result, gross income rose +12.7% year-on-year to €3.5 billion, on the back of higher net interest income (+27.4%), which reflects the impact of new production and the prevailing interest rate backdrop.
Revenues from services (wealth management, protection insurance and banking fees) amounted to €1.2 billion in the first quarter, +1.3% year-on-year following an increase in activity. The growth in revenues from wealth management (+15.8%) and protection insurance (+6.9%) offsets the decrease of banking fees (-10.8%), which were down, among other factors, due to lower account maintenance fees.
As a result, return on equity (ROE) stood at 13.4% at the end of March and the cost-to-income ratio improved once again to reach 40.3%.

Business volumes at an all-time high
Strong activity in the quarter cemented CaixaBank’s status as the leading financial institution in Spain and brought the bank’s business volume close to the one trillion-euro mark, an all-time high, after growing by more than €15 billion in the last year.
Customer funds amounted to €636.49 billion, up €6.16 billion in the quarter (+1%), underpinned by wealth management products.
On-balance sheet resources remained stable in the quarter at €463.51 billion and assets under management totalled €168.69 billion (+4.9% in the quarter), following the solid performance of the markets and significant inflows.
Net inflows into mutual funds, savings insurance and pension plans reached €3.44 billion between January and March, with money market funds being the main growth driver on the funds side. Meanwhile, protection insurance continued to perform well, with premiums growing +8.7% year-on-year.
The performing loan portfolio remained stable in the period at €344.44 billion (+0.1%). Mortgages continue to be affected by repayments, albeit at a slower pace. This factor, together with the growth in new production, allowed the registered decline (-0.7%) in the first quarter to be the smallest in the last five quarters. The consumer loan portfolio was up +2%, while the loans to business portfolio rose by +1.1%.

New loan production picked up during the period
Commercial activity remains buoyant, picking up the pace starting in late 2023 and speeding up into the first quarter of 2024, with significant growth in new loans to individuals. In particular, new mortgage lending amounted to €2.79 billion in the first quarter of 2024, up +24.1% year-on-year, while new consumer lending stood at €3.03 billion, up +15%.
New production in loans to businesses exceeded €10.5 billion through to the end of March, with 43,000 loans granted to SMEs during the quarter (+28% year-on-year).

Spain’s biggest international bank Santander signalled higher profitability this year as growth in lending income, particularly in its home market, helped drive first-quarter earnings higher.

The bank’s revenue rose 10% to a record high 15.38 billion euro, above the 15.06 billion analysts had expected.

The euro zone’s second-biggest bank by market value relied in the past on Latin America for revenue growth, but has recently also benefited from higher European interest rates.

“It has been a very strong start to the year… supported by good growth in net interest income in Europe and the Americas,” Executive Chair Ana Botin said in a statement.

The bank is “well on track” to meet its targets for the year, including a return on tangible equity (ROTE) of 16%, she added.

Chief Financial Officer Jose Garcia Cantera told analysts on call that would imply ending 2024 with a net profit above 12 billion euros.

Including the 335 million euro impact of the Spanish banking levy in Spain, ROTE already stood at 16.2%, compared with 14.9% reported in the quarter.

Net profit jumped to 2.85 billion euros in January to March, just short of the 2.87 billion expect by analysts.

Overall net loan provisions rose 9% while the cost of risk, which measures potential losses, rose 2 basis points to 120 bps.

LENDING BOOST IN SPAIN

At a group level, net interest income (NII) – earnings on loans minus deposit costs – rose 17.7% to 11.98 billion euros, above the 11.5 billion that analysts expected.

Against the previous quarter, NII rose 7.7% as euro zone interest rates remained higher for longer than expected, helping its Spanish business, which has been charging more on loans while keeping a lid on rates paid to savers.

Net profit in Spain rose 66%, while NII was up 24%.

In Brazil, net profit rose almost 20% despite higher provisions as net interest income increased by 25%.

The U.S. and the UK were weak spots, with net profit in the U.S. falling 6.8% due to higher investment costs and NII down 4.7% due to higher funding costs. In the UK net profit fell 22.8%.

Santander’s Tier-1 fully loaded capital ratio, the strictest measure of solvency, rose to 12.28% from 12.26% in the previous quarter.

Original Story: Reuters | Author: Jesus Aguado
Edition: Prime Yield