Sabadell Bank loses another of his historical executives. After the departure of former CEO Jaume Guardiola and former financial director Tomás Varela, the current CEO of the entity, César González-Bueno, announced on Monday the retirement of Michael Montes, the man who for the last decades has been in charge of lead the numerous integrations of other entities that the group has starred in. Between them, CAM uptake, which allowed the bank to make a significant leap in size and consolidate itself among the leading entities in the country.
was currently Director of Organization and Resourcesand maximum Head of Retail Banking of Sabadell, functions that will now be distributed among the executives Jorge Rodriguez (individuals), and the current director of regulatory compliance, Sonia Quibus, which will assume the rest of the areas, as explained by González-Bueno, during the annual meeting of the entity’s Advisory Councils. An event that he has had as a guest speaker with the vice president of the ECB, Luis de Guindos.
After spending the first part of his career in entities such as Catalan Bank, Atlantic Bank, Bancotrans and above all, Deutsche Bank Spain -where he held various positions of responsibility-, Miquel Montes moved to Sabadell in 2001 as director of operations, electronic business and technology.
In his long professional career of more than 40 years, the key role he has played in the integration process that Sabadell has starred in, and that have led him to consecutively absorb Banco Atlántico, Banco Urquijo, Banco Guipuzcoano, Banco CAM, Banco Gallego or the British TSB.
The key to the success of all these operations lies in the system promoted by Montes, which streamlines the migration of millions of data of clients of the absorbed entities to the Sabadell servers, preventing the process from being delayed.
But, in addition, treatment friendly and closethe personality of Montes also facilitated the understanding with the middle management and the rest of the personnel from the Alicante savings bank, which facilitated the operation, as well as the understanding with the Alicante business community.
Once the integration was completed -with which the CAM business was framed in the so-called Territorial Este del Sabadell, under the direction of Jaime Matas at the time-, the executive went on to chair the real estate company of the Solvia groupand from 2015 to 2019 he also served as non-executive director in the integration of the TSBone of the operations that has given him the most headaches, due to the failures that occurred in the computer process.
With the reorganization of the dome made by the new CEO, César González-Well, He became responsible for the area of individuals, one of the three large divisions in which the entire Sabadell business was separated.
bank tax
On the other hand, during the meeting of the Consultative Councils in which he announced the withdrawal of Montes, González-Bueno requested that the banking tax be temporary and does not “distort competition”Europe Press reports.
“It’s unexpected, no one likes to pay more taxes. And if it happens, finally, what we ask is that it be temporary and that it not distort competition”, González-Bueno stressed during his speech.
In addition, he recalled that the entity already paid last year in taxes around 800 million euros against a net profit of 530 million euros, given that the banks have a higher tax burden to that of other companies, in addition to other additional charges.
“It cannot be said that Banco Sabadell has not paid well”, he stressed. González-Bueno thus joins other executives in the sector such as the president of BBVA, Carlos Torres, who warned last week that this tax could be “counterproductive” because it will slow down the Spanish economy due to the vital role of the sector.
On the other hand, the CEO of the entity has highlighted the “radical” turn of the bank in just a year and a halfstarting from a “fantastic franchise”.
“The transformation is moving full speed ahead. Financial results have improved every quarter for the past six, giving analysts and investors tremendous confidence. From now on we expect more tailwinds than headwinds, and in short, a lot of confidence from Banco Sabadell looking forward”, he claimed.
González-Bueno has acknowledged that there are several uncertainties in the coming months that are added to this tax on banks, such as the rise in interest rates, the economic context and the energy crisis.
However, the bank believes that the movements in favor driven by rate hikes will have a very high impact, while those derived from inflation, such as non-performing loans and cost increases, will be more controllable and will move within a range ” reasonable”.
