Bankinter to pay a gross dividend of 0.13 euros per share on 1 October next
The bank is to resume its traditional shareholder remuneration policy once the ECB’s recommendation on dividends comes to an end.
It will be the first interim payment against recurring earnings for the first half of 2021 and will be paid entirely in cash.
Bankinter’s board of directors has agreed to pay the bank’s shareholders the first dividend against earnings for the first half of 2021, excluding the capital gain obtained from the spin-off of Línea Directa, for a total gross amount of 0.1332 euros per share (net amount of 0.1079 euros).
In this first payout to be charged to the current year, the bank will be distributing among its shareholders a total of 119.78 million euros in cash, up 168% on the 44.72 million euros delivered for the whole of 2020.
Bankinter is therefore poised to resume its traditional shareholder remuneration policy, once the ECB’s recommendation restricting the payment of dividends and the repurchase of bank shares ends on 1 October.
Bankinter is confident that its capital adequacy, profitability and asset quality are strong enough to resume its traditional payout of 50%, as demonstrated during the recent stress tests conducted by the EBA in July.
The stress tests that Europe’s main banks recently underwent at the hands of the European Banking Authority (EBA), in cooperation with the European Central Bank (ECB) and the European Systemic Risk Board (ESRB), revealed that of all Spanish banks Bankinter would suffer the least impact on its capital adequacy in the event of a hypothetical adverse macroeconomic scenario; and of all the European banks scrutinised it would be the third least affected.
It is worth noting that Bankinter envisioned a payout of 50% in both the baseline and adverse scenarios for all the years analysed.
In the first half of 2021, Bankinter posted a net recurring profit, excluding the capital gain earned from the spin-off of Línea Directa, of 244.5 million euros, all posted to reserves and up 124.1% on the first half of 2020, coupled with a sharp increase in commercial activity.