Santander creates a global Wealth Management division, comprising private banking and asset management, and appoints Víctor Matarranz as Head

Santander today announced the creation of a new division which will integrate its private banking and asset management businesses. The new Wealth Management division will be led by Victor Matarranz, until now head of Group Strategy. The new structure will enable the Group to provide better service to Santander’s global private banking customers and build on its competitive advantage in 10 major markets.

Following the repurchase of the entire Santander Asset Management business in November last year, the new division advances the bank’s strategy to further integrate Asset Management into the bank’s operations and allows it to leverage the capabilities of the Group to improve its operational efficiency. These are highly capital efficient business lines.

Today, Santander Private Banking manages more than €160 billion in customer funds, some of which are managed within the €180 billion of assets under management in Santander Asset Management. The target of the new division will be to grow these assets by double digits annually to 2020.

Under the leadership of Victor Matarranz, Senior Executive Vice President and member of the Management Committee, the new division will create a new model of service for its existing 170,000 clients worldwide, taking advantage of the scale and technological capabilities of Grupo Santander, and offering them a new digital platform to manage their financial needs with the experience of an extensive network of offices and managers around the world.

The new Wealth Management division will be comprised of the new private banking unit, Santander Asset Management’s business* and International Private Banking. The teams of the Private Banking and Asset Management units in countries will, in line with the Santander model, have a dual reporting line to the local Country Heads and the new Division Head.

For the past three years, Víctor Matarranz has been responsible for leading the Corporate Unit of Group Strategy, which will now be led by Enrique Álvarez, who has for the past two years been Deputy Director of the unit. Víctor Matarranz will report to Santander’s CEO, José Antonio Álvarez, and Enrique Álvarez to the Group’s executive chairman, Ana Botín.

Ana Botín said: “Our goal is to accelerate our digital transformation to meet the financial needs of our 131 million customers, at all times and from anywhere, in a simple, personal and fair way. The new global Wealth Management division will play a key role in this transformation in a very important segment for us in all our geographies that requires a combination of global and local service”.

José Antonio Álvarez said: “Private banking and asset management offer Santander an excellent opportunity for growth. We have set very ambitious goals for ourselves and I trust we will achieve them. The Santander model is perfectly fit to build a worldwide leader in wealth management based on cooperation and efficiency”.