Interview with Pablo de la Torre, Commercial Director of International Business at Banco Santander
Today we set our sights on the exterior sector; We want to know what is happening currently and what the prospects are for 2022. We interviewed Pablo de la Torre, Commercial Director of International Business at Banco Santander, an entity that works hand in hand with internationalized Spanish companies.
The covid-19 crisis caused a strong impact on global economies and trade in 2020, which have been recovering so far in 2021. What are the prospects for the remainder of the year and for 2022?
Pablo de la Torre: “The appearance of Covid generated an unprecedented crisis, first of all confronting us with the need for confinement to prevent the spread of the disease and the need to find a health solution to this crisis. Secondly, a total dependence on established supply chains, generating serious problems for access to essential goods such as masks, respirators, etc.
This contextualization is important because it can give us a clue about the forecasts for the 22nd. The pandemic has shown us that we live in a totally globalized world, and that The way out of the crisis involves overcoming it as a whole, and at this time there are important imbalances in the evolution of vaccination, and these imbalances generate important imbalances in supply and demand worldwide, with a strong impact on access to raw materials and components with the increase in the price of certain products and affecting the increase in inflation.
We are at historic highs in terms of family savings and strong demand in both the United States and the Eurozone but This demand cannot be fully met until the large producing areas, in this case Asia and Latam, overcome the pandemic.
Therefore, although at the beginning of the pandemic the economies that had the most impact were those most dependent on services, most dependent on mobility; On the other hand, the most industrialized economies weathered the situation better, the forecasts for 2022 are that the economies in which the weight of the service sector is stronger and once the mobility problems were overcome, have a faster recovery and in higher percentages; On the other hand, those more industrialized economies do not have a full recovery as long as the main supply chains and those materials that come from Latam and Asia do not arrive normally.
Are there sectors that have emerged stronger from this crisis? On the contrary, which sectors has it hurt the most?
Q: “We understand that the sectors that best weathered the situation during the crisis were evidently the healthcare, pharmaceutical and biotechnology sector, Technology, communication, computing and innovation companies, etc., also received a boost, and of course the food and distribution sector. In addition to evolving positively, they have also proven to be strategic for the development of a country.
Obviously the most affected are tourism, hospitality, etc. those more dependent on mobility.”
What are the factors that are influencing the competitiveness of internationalized Spanish companies today?
Q: “In addition to the already mentioned problem generated in the supply chain by access to certain raw materials and components, I would highlight two additional ones: the increase in the cost of freight and the increase in the price of energy.
According to the British consultancy Iuric, during the last 12 months the increase in freight costs has been more than 350% and it has also done so unevenly depending on the transport corridor we are talking about. What are the main elements that have influenced this increase? We would highlight four: the first, port congestion; the second, imbalance in demand, that motivates the need for a greater number of containers in transit, which forces shipping companies to buy more containers; thirdly the oil price increase and the commitment of transport operators to sustainability and the Paris agreement; and finally the increase in transit time, given that the time spent in port for goods has doubled in the last year, going from 6 to 12 days.
In the opinion of the main transport operators, the solution involves, on the one hand, generating long-term contracts that provide reliability, price stability and delivery forecasts, and with that to be able to stabilize the stock and merchandise of the companies. Price stability is initially expected for 2022, but we will have to see how it evolves.
And the other element that is greatly affecting the competitiveness of companies is the increase in the cost of energy at a time when we are moving towards a more sustainable energy model. The decarbonization of Europe, the commitment to renewable energies and the storage they require is generating an increase in costs in the short term.”
How different is the new international scenario for business from what we had before March 2020?
Q: “Well, I would highlight two elements: one, the need to diversify supply chains to avoid dependence on traditional commercial corridors, both in the case of domestic and international suppliers.
And the second is the importance of digitalization, this has proven to be a great ally of companies during the pandemic, becoming a fundamental tool for the development and distribution of new products.”
Digitalization has accelerated tremendously as a result of Covid-19, and particularly in banking services; Do you have any news on digital services for the coming months?
P. of the T: “Santander has the ambition to become the best open financial services platform in the world and to this end the group recently presented strategic initiatives that seek digital development and investment in technology. Recently the creation of Pagonext, An autonomous and global payments platform that will become the technological axis of the group is a clear commitment to competitiveness and the search for a tool that allows us to group all international payments, financing and currency management for both Santander clients and for the open market, and that allows SMEs to access sophisticated and innovative financial products.
Likewise, during the pandemic we have launched a series of digital innovations, among which I would highlight three. Last year Santander launched the first digital guarantee services of Spanish banking dedicated to those companies that need this guarantee in their daily operations and the possibility of requesting both domestic and international guarantees in a digital and agile way.
The second was the international payment and collection tracking service intended for companies and that allows companies with total autonomy and in a digital way to have total control over the transfers issued and referred and over the entire transactionality of their daily activity.
And thirdly the launch of digital currency trading. This new service offers companies the possibility of viewing, contracting and mobilizing their currency in an autonomous way, with absolute versatility and agility, and that allows them to adapt to their needs.
The bank combines all these digital capabilities with a team of specialists who support in the territory all clients who have that vocation of opening to the outside world.”
When it comes to tackling a new international business, an expansion into a new market, access to financing is important. How has Banco Santander granted financing this last year?
Q: "Although companies and families faced this crisis with lower debt levels than in previous crises, the deployment by European governments of support measures, in this case unprecedented, both in terms of the volume of this aid and the agility in their implementation, have been decisive in avoiding the destruction of the productive fabric and the precariousness of many families.
Santander, seeking to be part of the solution to the problem and understanding that providing companies with liquidity was a priority at this time, led the granting of financing, both with loans provided directly by the entity and through ICO O Cesce aid, in the latter case. for exporting clients.
Evidence of this support are the more than 250.000 loans facilitated by the bank for more than 32.000 million".
Finally, what role do you at Banco Santander think the Spanish foreign sector should play in the economic recovery?
Q: “At Santander we believe that once again The foreign sector will be the engine of recovery and that growth passes through access to different supply chains that allow us to meet the internal demand of our industries and families, and on the other hand the opening to new markets that register an unsatisfied demand and in which we can position our services and products.
To achieve this, at Santander, in addition to making a wide range of products and services available to our customers and which can also be consumed digitally, we also want to help companies in their process of opening abroad. With two initiatives: one, the Santander Trade Global Alliance platform, which makes it possible to establish commercial contacts with companies in an exclusive space where the company's commercial interests can be made known to the world. These companies can identify new clients and suppliers abroad in an environment of more than 16.000 Santander clients in the group's different geographies.
And on the other hand, the recent creation at the end of last year of Santander One Europe, a new operating model, with the efficiencies derived from having common products and regional structures in Spain, the United Kingdom, Portugal and Poland, which allow Santander to respond more agilely to the needs of its clients, with the creation of a more agile platform. simple and efficient and that offers the best products. Ultimately, with One Europe we are going to improve the experience and make it more homogeneous for all our clients, especially multinational companies.”
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