Bankia reduces its profit by 23% in 2019, to 541 million

Bankia earned a profit of 541 million euros last year, 23% lower than that obtained in 2018 due to the lower result achieved with the rotation of fixed-income portfolios (ROF), as well as the higher provisions associated with the cost of sale of unproductive assets.

The entity emphasizes, however, that “it has been the best year in commercial terms since its creation”, due to “the trust of our clients and the great effort made by the bank's professionals, thanks to which we have set a new maximum in customer satisfaction and achieved a general increase in our market shares. “

The nationalized bank, with these numbers, is far from market forecasts, which pointed to profits of over 600 million and half the goal of reaching 1,200 million by the end of 2020. Even so, the entity has already admitted that It would not meet the benefits goal of its three-year plan due to the negative rate situation. Moreover, in the last quarter of 2019 it has registered losses of 34 million, following the return of the Treasury of 2 million by Companies.

In 2019, Bankia's interest margin totaled 2,023 million, 1.3% less. In this way, he argues that this rubric “has practically stabilized”, since in the fourth quarter it registered a 0.2% increase over the previous quarter.

Revenue from commissions reached 1,081 million euros, 1.5% more than in 2018 thanks to the inter-annual evolution of revenues in means of payment (9.9%) and assets under management (4.7%) . In the last quarter of the year, the commissions managed to advance to their level over the year, after growing 8% in the inter-quarterly rate.

These higher commission revenues have been offset by lower capital gains from the sale of the debt portfolio and an increase in the provisions, up to 673 million to increase the coverage in the lots of delinquent loans and real estate foreclosed for sale, with the objective to accelerate balance cleaning.

Bankia has been able to mitigate the impact of negative rates with an increase in activity. Healthy credit was driven by the new production of operations by 0.2%, to 106,700 million. Thus, in consumer loans, the stock grew by 12.5%, while the granting of mortgages reached around 2,900 million, a third of which were subscribed with new clients.

Dividend

After approving these accounts, the board of directors has agreed to keep the dividend at 11.57 cents per share, which represents a total amount of 355 million euros, of which 62% will go to the BFA matrix coffers – 100% of the State-. Of course, the distribution is a pay out of 65%, well above the set around half of the profits in previous years.

BFA, therefore, will receive 220 million, so that the total figure returned to the holding will amount to 3,303 million, including sales of the shares in the capital, although the State, through the Frob, has not been able to recover anything because This money has been allocated to compensation to shareholders, customers and investors, as well as sanitation.

The president said in a statement that “the entity has registered a new increase in the solvency level, to close, for the first time, above 13%, thus maintaining the leadership among our large competitors and well above regulatory requirements “.

Bankia will not reach its commitment to pay 2,500 million to its shareholders until 2020