Bankinter has called the General Shareholders Meeting for March 27 in Madrid. The bank's board of directors will submit several agenda items for approval by the Annual General Meeting, including the incorporation of two new independent external directors. They are Juan Antonio Zufiría Zataraín and Alfonso Villanueva Rodríguez, with extensive experience as senior managers in technology companies such as IBM and Paypal.

 

Juan Antonio Zufiría Zataraín is an aeronautical engineer with a PhD in Applied Mathematics and Aeronautical Engineering. He has held a range of positions, such as Global Vice President of Technology Services at IBM, General Manager of IBM Europe, General Manager of IBM Europe Global Technology Services and Chairman of IBM Spain, Portugal, Greece and Israel.

 

Alfonso Villanueva Rodríguez has an MA from Northeastern University in Boston and an MBA in Finance from the London Business School. He has served as Global Executive Vice President of Strategy, Corporate Development and Entrepreneurship at PayPal and as head of PayPal Ventures in San Francisco, proprietary director representing PayPal on the board of directors of Mercado Libre (Mexico and Brazil), Chief Innovation Officer of SingTel in Singapore and as a senior partner at McKinsey & Company.

 

These appointments reinforce the capabilities of Bankinter's board of directors in terms of technology and innovation, both of which are hallmarks of the bank, which has been a pioneer in many cutting-edge services and products.

 

It is also submitting a proposal to increase the number of directors from 11 to 12 for approval to the Annual General Meeting. This number is below the maximum of 15 established in the bank's by-laws. If approved by the Annual General Meeting, these appointments will cover the new director's seat and a vacancy created by the resignation, for personal reasons, of the current director Álvaro Álvarez-Alonso Plaza.

 

The new board would be comprised of 58% independent directors (7 out of 12) compared to the current 54% (6 out of 11), with 58% of the directors being female. This demonstrates the bank's firm commitment to good corporate governance. Bankinter stands out for having the highest percentage of women on the board - and for having both a female chair and a female CEO, another distinctive feature - not only in the Ibex but in the international banking world.

 

Dividend

 

The Annual General Meeting will vote on the payment of 0.12 euros gross per share as a final dividend charged to 2024 results on 3 April, representing payment of 110.96 million euros to shareholders. Adding the other two ordinary dividend payments already made in June and December of last year, the total gross dividend for the 2024 financial year would be, in total, 0,53 euros per share. This would bring the total amount paid by the bank as dividends from last year's results to 476.49 million euros.