At present, the priority of the Spanish Banking Association is to continue helping Spanish families and businesses overcome the deep economic crisis caused by the pandemic, and to contribute, as much as possible, to driving the recovery of activity and growth once COVID-19 has been overcome.
With this mission, the Association is redoubling its efforts to support its member banks in the many initiatives they have undertaken to support their customers, such as deferrals of mortgage and consumer loan payments for individuals, or financing for companies through ICO loans guaranteed by the State, among many other measures.
This was stated today by our President, José María Roldán, at the press conference to analyse banks’ annual results and the situation and outlook for the sector in the current challenging context, still marked by the pandemic, which has caused an unprecedented contraction in global economic activity.
Despite the persistence of the health crisis and the prolonged environment of low official interest rates in Europe, Spanish banks have been able to put in place a broad range of effective measures to meet the needs of households and businesses thanks to their solvency and comfortable liquidity position, as shown by the annual results analysed today.
Banks sustained the flow of financing to the economy in 2020: lending to companies increased, while, in the case of households, the reduction in consumption was accompanied by an increase in savings. And with the measures adopted by banks and the authorities, non-performing loans are contained.
The decline in profit and loss account margins and the extraordinary effort made in provisions are the main effects explaining the 2020 results for banks across the euro area, our President explained when presenting the annual results.
