BCP will once again distribute dividends to shareholders, presented by Nuno Amado on Monday, while presenting the results of the bank, referring to the year 2021. “We intend to return to dividends, but in a very moderate way,” explained the bank’s president, adding that the amount will be proposed at the meeting year to shareholders in April. Reportedly, in September, Miguel Maya announced that the bank would wait for the next results (those for 2021 now shown) to make a decision, at a time when Poland continues to represent significant “instability” for the bank.

Poland is sinking results

BCP made a profit of 138.1 million euros in 2021, 24.6% lower than the 183 million euros recorded in 2020.

In a statement sent to the Securities Market Committee, the bank justifies the deterioration of the result by three factors: a fee of 532.6 million linked to the loan portfolio in Swiss francs granted by the subsidiary in Poland, expenses of 90.7 million euros mainly related to the personnel adjustment, and 56.2 million euros from contributions mandatory from the banking sector.

In recent years, the bank has been penalized for its operations in Poland. The subject of the question is the Swiss franc loans made in 2008 by the Millennium Bank. The appreciation of the Swiss currency in the foreign exchange market caused difficulties for the holders of these credits, and in 2019 the European Court of Justice ruled the right of customers to request the conversion of loans into local currency, which prompted the Polish institution owned by the Portuguese bank to make the provisions.

Asked when this process would end, Miguel Maya stressed that “there are no easy solutions to difficult problems” and that “we are not in a hurry to come up with the maximum solution, we want everything to be resolved strictly”. “This is not an issue that depends on us, it is about Poland and European bodies.”