Santander Sees Record Profit as Strong Global Businesses Drive Success
Santander, the Spanish banking giant, has reported a record profit of EUR 3.6 billion for Q1 2026, marking another excellent quarter for the company.
According to Héctor, CEO of Santander, the strong performance was driven by all of the company's global businesses, with underlying metrics excluding impacts from Poland making the accounts comparable. This demonstrates the strength of Santander's strategy and the resilience of its business model.
The profit increase of 12% versus Q1 2025 is supported by a solid franchise with a growing customer base, which continues to enhance customer experience leveraging on global platforms. One Transformation, the company's strategic plan, has made excellent progress towards a simpler and more integrated model, translating into tangible results such as improved efficiency by 2 percentage points and underlying Return On Tangible Common Equity (ROTC) increasing to 15.2%.
Santander's balance sheet remains very solid with robust credit quality and a strong Common Equity Tier 1 (CET1) capital ratio reaching another all-time high of 14.4%. This contributed to a strong shareholder value creation within a plus dividend per share growing at 19%.
The company's income statement shows a very strong performance from top to bottom, with underlying profit growing double digits year-over-year. Revenue grew by 6% in constant euros, supported by all global businesses, while expenses fell, showcasing the positive effects of transformation.
Net Interest Income (NII) and fees up 5% and 7%, respectively, accounted for around 95% of total income, with a significant increase of 8 million customers and network benefits captured through global businesses. The motor finance provision in U.K. had an impact of EUR 210 million, but the company's results are sustainable and less volatile than peers.
Santander's CEO, Héctor, emphasized that their business model is unique as it combines global and market scale with customer focus and diversification across Europe and the Americas. The three-pillar core, supported by disciplined capital allocation and investment in data and AI, delivers consistent results.
The company's customers are a key highlight, with 8 million new customers added year-on-year, making progress towards their target of reaching 210 million customers by 2028. Revenue per active customer grew 3% while cost decreased 4%, driven by One Transformation.
