MADRID: Santander on Wednesday said its fourth-quarter net profit fell 90 percent to 277 million euros ($333.45 million) compared to the same quarter in 2019 due to restructuring costs, mainly in Spain, and higher provisions to weather the COVID-19 impact.
Analysts polled by Reuters expected Santander to book on average a net profit of 411 million euros, though estimates varied from 102 million euros to 616 million euros.
Overall, Santander reported an annual net loss ever of 8.77 billion euros, its first annual loss ever, after having set aside one-off charges worth 12.6 billion euros in the second quarter as the pandemic forced it to writedown previous acquisitions.
With regard to the dividend payment against 2020, the board of directors intends to pay a cash dividend of 0.0275 euros per share, the maximum allowed in accordance with the limits set by the European Central Bank (ECB) in its recommendation last December.
