The Banker sought to measure the trend of cross-border expansion into Latin America and has looked at the total assets of banks’ foreign subsidiaries in Latin America – irrespective of where the bank is headquartered, be it North America, Europe, Asia or Latin America.
As can be seen in chart one, Spanish banks have the strongest presence across Latin America. Currently, the 16 Spanish-owned subsidiaries in the region have aggregate assets of $494.5bn. Spain-based Santander is by far the largest foreign bank present in the region, with total assets of $329.6bn in Latin America.
