Ana Botín Appointed to Santander Holdings USA and Santander Bank Boards of Directors

BOSTON and MADRID, Oct. 7, 2019 /PRNewswire/ -- Santander Group today announced that Ana Botín, Executive Chairman of Banco Santander, is joining the Boards of Directors of Santander Holdings USA, Inc. (SHUSA) and Santander Bank, N.A. (SBNA), effective Oct. 21, 2019. The appointments are subject to regulatory approval.

In the last several years Santander has worked diligently to strengthen its US businesses. Notable milestones include closing two Written Agreements with the Federal Reserve, earning a Community Reinvestment Act (CRA) rating upgrade from the OCC, among others. The US team has also improved business profitability, growing customers across all the US businesses and more than doubling its contribution to Group's earnings. Throughout 2018, and for the first half of 2019, the US' year-over-year earnings growth has been the highest of all Santander Group countries.

Between 2016-2018, Santander US' attributable profit to the Santander Group increased more than 60%, from $401mm to $651mm. On an underlying basis, attributable profit was up 42% in 2018, and 30% in the first half of 2019.

Ana Botín said, "Our team in the US is making outstanding progress in transforming the business and improving customer service, and in the last two years they have achieved a number of important milestones. The US has been the fastest growing of all our markets in recent quarters, growing underlying profit by 42% in 2018, and 30% in the first half of 2019. We have more to do and see significant opportunities for further growth, and I'm looking forward to working even more closely with our Boards and management team in this country."

SHUSA and SBNA Boards Chairman, Tim Ryan, said, "We welcome Ana to our Boards and know she will add tremendous value and perspective to our work. While we work with Ana regularly today, having her more deeply involved in the Boards' deliberations will support our continued goal of helping people and businesses prosper in the US."

Scott Powell, Santander US CEO, said, "We are pleased to have Ana join our Boards and look forward to collaborating with her as we move forward with our objective of continuing to grow profitability, operating at large financial institution standards, and better serving our customers and communities."

Santander Holdings USA is part of the Santander Group, which serves over 140 million customers across Europe, North America and South America. Over the past five years the Group has increased customer revenues by more than 20%, growing attributable profit by 87%, while also increasing cash dividends per share by 174% over the same period.

Banco Santander (SAN SM, STD US, BNC LN) is a leading retail and commercial bank, founded in 1857 and headquartered in Spain. It has a meaningful presence in 10 core markets in Europe and the Americas, and is the largest bank in the euro zone by market capitalization. At the end of June 2019, Banco Santander had EUR 1.03 trillion in customer funds (deposits and mutual funds), 142 million customers, 13,000 branches and 200,000 employees. Banco Santander made underlying profit of EUR 4,045 million in the first half of 2019, an increase of 2% in constant euros compared to the same period last year.

Santander Holdings USA, Inc. (SHUSA) is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Madrid-based Banco Santander, S.A. (NYSE: SAN) (Santander), one of the most respected banking groups in the world with more than 142 million customers in the U.K., Europe, Latin America and the U.S. As the intermediate holding company for Santander's U.S. businesses, SHUSA includes five financial companies with more than 17,500 employees, 5.2 million customers and assets of over $144.8 billion. These include Santander Bank, N.A., one of the country's largest retail and commercial banks by deposits; Santander Consumer USA Holdings Inc. (NYSE: SC), an auto finance and consumer lending company; Banco Santander International of Miami; Banco Santander Puerto Rico and Santander Securities LLC; and Santander Investment Securities Inc. For more information about Santander Bank, visit www.santanderbank.com.

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SOURCE Santander Holdings USA, Inc.