Bankinter : reaches 6.8 billion euros in international corporate banking business

Bankinter ended 2016 with a turnover of 6.82 billion euros from its international corporate banking business, compared with 5.7 billion in the previous year (+18%). This figure includes customer deposits and trade financing, bank guarantees, letters of credit and cash foreign currency transactions, and exchange rate insurance. All in all, international banking has become one of the most thriving activities under Bankinter's corporate banking area, increasing its gross operating income by 27% this year.

In the breakdown by activity, a significant figure is that of the loan book relating to international transactions of Bankinter customers, with a year-end balance of 3.44 billion euros, up 27% from 2.69 billion euros in 2015.

Furthermore, total transactions brokered by Bankinter in international trade finance for imports and exports, payments and collections, and other international methods of payment used by our customers increased in 2016 by 10.32%, involving such major industries as infrastructure, rail transport, renewable energy and automobile, mainly in the Middle East, Europe, the US, Canada, Latin America and Africa.

Bankinter has an extensive network of partner banks across the globe through which it channels its customers' transactional business at prices that point up Bankinter's exceptional risk profile in Spain and Portugal.

International corporate banking in Spain.

After more than four years of current account surpluses in Spain, international business has become a keystone in Spain's economic recovery. This current account surplus comes mainly on the back of the balance of payments, which in 2016 was over 23 billion euros, with exports exceeding 33% of Spanish GDP. This is a key indicator, as it reveals that Spanish companies have become more competitive abroad.

Aware of this unparalleled shift in the Spanish economy, Bankinter revamped its international area two years ago, with new personnel and resources to capitalise on the trend of this particular line of business.

Bankinter has 90,471 active corporate banking customers, of which more than 38,000 depend on the bank to carry out international transactions. Bankinter's long and specialised track record in corporate banking, its positive solvency, profitability and asset quality ratios, and its acclaimed reputation in the market, alongside the considerable growth of exports by Spanish companies during the crisis, have allowed the bank to achieve these growth figures in this business, which a new outlook for 2017 in light of Bankinter's recent acquisition of Barclays' retail and wealth business in Portugal.