The Banker: BPI is “Bank of the year” in Portugal
This was the first time that BPI, held by CaixaBank's Catalans, won the "Bank of the Year" award. Its response to the pandemic weighed on The Banker magazine decision.
BPI was elected “Bank of the Year 2020” in Portugal, a distinction made by The Banker magazine, of the Financial Times group, and which had been awarded in recent years to Santander Totta.
This was the first time that the bank owned by the Catalan group CaixaBank received this award, which is granted annually in London and distinguishes the best banks from 150 countries. In the last four years, the “Bank of the Year” award was given to Santander Totta.
For this decision, The Banker took into account several factors, from the quality of BPI’s financial results, the growth of market shares in most segments and the expansion of the customer base to the introduction of ESG (Environmental, social and governance) criteria in BPI’s risk and investment analysis.
In a year marked by the pandemic, the capacity to respond to this economic and social crisis resulting from the Covid-19 pandemic, including from the technological and innovation point of view, was also an analyzed metric.
For the bank’s CEO, “this distinction recognises the success of BPI’s strategy based on service quality, digitalisation and social commitment”. “BPI has a capital situation, liquidity, asset quality and reputation that distinguishes it in the Portuguese market, and which has been recognized by prestigious independent international entities,” stressed João Pedro Oliveira e Costa.
