Unicaja arrived at this year 2024 with a somewhat different situation than the rest of its peers as it was still in a transition period after the merger operation with Liberbank which began in 2021. After a somewhat hesitant start, the Malaga bank has finally joined the pace of the stock market sector and now more than 42% are rated since the beginning of the year, overtaking CaixaBank and placing itself as the second most bullish bank of the year on the Ibexonly behind Sabadell, conditioned by the public purchase offer launched by BBVA in the middle of the year.
The proof of having successfully completed this transition phase can be found in your income statement. For the end of the year, the consensus of analysts collected by FactSet forecasts a net profit of 584 million, the highest in its history and more than double last year. This past quarter, they beat consensus interest margin estimates, bringing profitability to 7% RoTE.
Either way, this strong rise that the entity has accumulated so far this year has swallowed up much of its potential and, from current levels, analytical houses only see 15% additional potential at its average price target, a trajectory that, although it is in double digits, is lower than that of the rest of the banks, where Santander and BBVA stand out from the others, almost 30%.
Like the rest of the sector, 2024 will represent a ceiling for the company’s profits given the rate cuts that have already begun and which will continue in the months to come. Indeed, in this normalization, analysts predict a gradual decrease in their profits up to the 434 million expected in 2026.
Unicaja is one of the banks that benefits from the change in banking taxation. BNP experts predict that this change, which makes the tax more progressive by increasing the tax on the highest profit brackets, will improve earnings per share in 2025 by 8.6% compared to the regulations. previous one which provided for a fixed rate. rate of 4.8%.
“After several quarters of unencouraging developments, the latter had a positive surprise reflecting better developments and good prospects for the end of the year,” explains Deutsche Bank. “The fall in interest rates will constitute a headwind but will be partially offset by a reduction in the cost of liabilities, also maintaining the good quality of your credit in addition to the positive impact of the regulatory change on taxation”, they continue . “For all this, we hope that 2025 will be a good year for Unicaja, also highlighting its shareholder remuneration policy,” they conclude.
From Renta 4 they claim that “the expected profit generation for 2025 supports the maintenance of comfortable capital levels, an aspect that provides a large cushion to face possible unexpected negative effects”. “In addition, there is the possibility of seeing the corporate operation as an element of value support and potential dividend improvement,” they conclude.
First dividend
Unicaja will pay its shareholders a dividend of six cents gross per share on December 19based on the results of 2024, as indicated last Friday by the entity. This is an amount equivalent to 52% of the consolidated net profit for the first half. This is the first time that the entity has distributed an interim dividend since its IPO.
The bank distributed its last dividend on April 19 for a value of 0.049 euros per share. “The excellent levels of solvency and the significant improvement in the entity’s net income have enabled this interim dividend for the 2024 financial year to exceed the total paid in 2023 by more than 20%,” notes the entity in a press release.
