Banco Sabadell has weight in the tourism sector. A lot. In fact, it has a market share of around 25%, which, instead of expanding, should even be reduced slightly to satisfy the European Central Bank (ECB), which prefers less exposure to the sectors, despite the fact that the entity ensures that the risk is very limited.
The specialization, they say, allows for very strict risk control, but the monetary authority does not want upsets like the ones that triggered the financial crisis in 2008 with the construction sector. One of the obsessions of the team that runs this business is risk control, which, they say, is very limited.
Tourism has become an object of dispute among financial institutions, given its weight in Spain. CaixaBank also has a unit that specializes in this business, of which it also claims leadership. And it is an essential activity in the Spanish economy.
Slow recovery
Prior to the pandemic, the tourism sector accounted for 12.4% of gross domestic product (GDP), while in 2020 it plummeted to 5.5%, as a result of the confinements and restrictions caused by the expansion of the coronavirus. Last year it exceeded 7% and is expected to regain more weight with the return of normalcy.
The Sabadell division, which includes hotels, campsites and travel agencies (leisure and catering are not part of this area), was created in 2013 and has an annual turnover of around 5 billion euros, of which a total of 3.6 billion are 14,000 customers in the sector in Spain, ranging from large hotel chains to small and medium-sized tourism businesses.
Seven out of 10 of these companies are located on the Mediterranean coast, mainly in Catalonia, the Valencian Community, Andalusia, the Balearic Islands, as well as in the Carias. The rest, about 1.4 billion are investments from customers in the sector abroad, especially in the Caribbean, according to Sabadell.
The specialized team headed by Pere Cases, former territorial head of the bank in Catalonia, has the reinforcement in addition to certain branches in which there are managers who in their portfolios have clients only from the tourism and hotel sector.
This division, which has gained weight over the years, has the main operators in the sector, both large and small and medium-sized enterprises.
Specific services
In addition to managing its resources and granting loans tailored to its needs, the bank provides very specific services ranging from hotel insurance to security in the collection of reservations, specialized financing or the « renting ».
In fact, the “renting” of items that are not part of the core of the business, such as televisions, mattresses or photovoltaic panels in hotels, is becoming more and more widespread in the tourism business.
One of the industry’s bets is on energy efficiency, which is also used to finance, they explain in the bank. And it is that the hotel and tourist areas have had to change the way they operate their properties giving priority to sustainability, energy efficiency and the circular economy, which are aspects that the bank also finances.