管理層發言
Good morning, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to the Bladex Second Quarter 2026 Earnings Conference Call. A slide presentation is accompanying today's webcast and is also available on the Investors section of the company's website, www.bladex.com. There will be an opportunity for you to ask questions at the end of today's presentation. Please note today's conference call is being recorded. As a reminder, all participants will be in listen-only mode. I would now like to turn the call over to Mr. Jorge Salas, Chief Executive Officer. Sir, please go ahead.
Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us today to discuss Bladex results for the second quarter of 2026. I will begin with the key highlights and then Annette, our CFO, will walk you through the financials in more detail. After that, I will come back and provide a quick update on our strategic execution, our view of the macro environment and our outlook for the rest of the year. Finally, we will open the call for questions. Let me start with the headline. We are thrilled with our performance this quarter, not only because we reached record levels across several areas of the business. But more importantly, because we're starting to see the strategy we shared with you all at our Investor Day translate into tangible results. We delivered strong commercial execution, further extended our funding base and continue to broaden our revenue mix just like we anticipated. The commercial portfolio reached a record of $13 billion, up 8% from March, 20% year-over-year and 17% since year-end. Both loans and contingencies also closed at new heights. This is exactly the kind of disciplined capital deployment we had in mind when we completed the AT1 issuance last year. We're putting the capital to work to support growth while maintaining a strong capital position. On the funding side, deposits reached a record of $7.9 billion, 8% sequentially and 20% since December. Funding kept pace with the expansion of the commercial portfolio and our diversified deposit base continues to provide a solid foundation for balance sheet growth. Turning to revenues. Net interest reached another new high, increasing 4% for the quarter, supported by higher average loan balances and disciplined balance sheet management. At the same time, margins remain under pressure. Net interest margin declined by 10 basis points to 2.24%, mainly reflecting higher average liquidity and continued competitive pressures on spreads. This remains consistent with the environment we discussed during the first quarter call. Noninterest income is perhaps the biggest highlight of the quarter. It is also a fundamental part of the strategy presented at the Investor Day. The focus is to diversify the bank's revenue base, which is particularly important when there is margin compression. This focus is clearly turning into visible results. Noninterest income reached a record of $25 million for the quarter, up 86% from the first quarter and represented 26% of total revenues in the quarter. This is meaningful progress in making our earnings less dependent on interest margin. Just a few years ago, noninterest income over total income was close to 15%. And our loan syndications team had one of the best quarters ever, and the client derivatives business is also starting to gain traction in line with plan. The pilot transactions continue to perform well and are primarily linked to structured transactions of our clients. Annette will take you through the composition of noninterest income and the activity in these businesses in more detail in a few minutes. Expenses, on the other hand, increased as expected as we continue to execute our strategic initiatives. Revenues, however, grew faster than costs. As a result, efficiency improved meaningfully to 24.1% for the quarter. Now as we have said before, we do expect expenses to increase in the second half of the year as we continue to execute the investment plan contemplated for 2026. Provisions also increased during the quarter, mainly as a result of the strong portfolio growth and our prudent approach to risk management. Overall, asset quality remains sound. Finally, net income reached a record of $66.5 million, up 18% from the first quarter, which translates into a return on equity of 16.4%. Our Tier 1 capital ratio closed the quarter at 16.6%, still comfortably above our target and providing capacity to continue supporting disciplined growth. This was an all-around excellent quarter. We've put capital to work, broadened our revenue base and improved profitability and efficiency despite continued pressure on margins. With that overview, let me now hand it over to Annette for a more detailed review of the financial results. Annette, your turn.
Thank you, Jorge, and good morning, everyone. The second quarter was another strong period for Bladex with several key balance sheet and revenue metrics reaching new highs. Commercial activity and deposits continued to expand, net interest income increased and fee generation was particularly strong, while asset quality and capital remain sound. Turning to our financial performance. Net income reached $66.5 million, up 18% from the first quarter. Return on average assets was 2% while adjusted return on equity improved to 16.4%. For the first half of the year, net income totaled $122.8 million, resulting in a return on average assets of 1.9% and an adjusted return on equity of 15.3%. Given the transactional nature of structuring revenues, the quarterly contribution of noninterest income will naturally vary. Even so, based on our first half performance and expectations for the remainder of the year, we are reaffirming our full year adjusted ROE guidance of 14% to 15%. Let me now walk you through the key drivers behind these results, beginning with the commercial portfolio. The commercial portfolio ended the quarter at $13 billion, up 8% from the first quarter and 20% year-over-year. Growth was broad-based across loans and contingencies, reflecting continued execution across our core markets. Loans increased to $10.5 billion, up 8% from the first quarter and 22% year-over-year, while contingencies reached EUR 2.3 billion increasing 11% from the first quarter and 5% year-over-year. Importantly, average loan balances increased steadily throughout the quarter, providing the primary support for higher net interest income despite continued pressure on lending spreads. Commercial activity remained healthy across both trade finance and medium-term lending. This quarter's strong growth was driven by strategic industries and high-quality client relationships that support sustainable net interest income generation rather than by pursuing volume for its own sake. We also continue to originate medium-term transactions with attractive risk-adjusted returns, supporting a more balanced asset mix and enhancing the quality of earnings over time. At the same time, strong trade-related activity preserved the portfolio's predominantly short-dated profile with approximately 65% of the portfolio scheduled to mature within the next 12 months. Looking ahead, we expect portfolio growth to continue at a steady and disciplined pace, consistent with our long-term strategy. Quarter-over-quarter growth was led by Panama and Argentina, with additional contribution from Dominican Republic, Peru and Brazil. The portfolio remains well diversified across countries and industries. No single country accounted for more than 14% of total exposure. Financial institutions represented 27% of the portfolio, while corporate exposures continue to reflect the diversity of regional trade flows. The commercial bank portfolio remained broadly stable at $226 million. Given current market conditions, we continue to prioritize lending opportunities over incremental investment purchases. This quarter demonstrates our ability to grow the portfolio while maintaining disciplined underwriting, broad diversification and prudent capital deployment. Turning now to liquidity and the treasury investment portfolio. At quarter end, liquidity assets totaled approximately $1.9 billion, representing 13.3% of total assets and remaining well within regulatory requirements and our risk appetite. Our liquidity profile remains conservative. A significant portion is held at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, with the remainder primarily placed with high-quality financial institutions and multilateral organizations. The treasury investment portfolio totaled $1.4 billion at quarter end. It remains highly investment grade, short in duration and broadly diversified outside Latin America. In addition to providing credit diversification, the portfolio serves as a source of contingent liquidity as these securities are eligible to be placed through our New York agency at the Federal Reserve discount window. Turning now to asset quality. Overall, credit quality remains sound, supported by disciplined underwriting, broad portfolio diversification and proactive credit risk management. At quarter-end, 98.4% of total credit exposure of $14.2 billion remained in Stage 1. Stage 2 exposures declined to 1.1% or $162 million, reflecting credit improvements, repayments, maturities and the migration of our previously identified exposure to Stage 3. Stage 3 exposure increased to 0.5% or $75 million, primarily reflecting the migration of debt exposure which has been under enhanced monitoring. As part of our proactive risk management approach, we reduced the overall exposure by selling the bilateral loan component. The remaining deferred payment letter of credit exposure was reclassified to Stage 3 and remains currently reserved. Importantly, this migration was limited to a single exposure and does not reflect a broader deterioration in the portfolio. Provisioning expense totaled $8.6 million compared with $4.7 million in the first quarter. Stage 1 provisioning accounted for $6.4 million, primarily reflecting continued portfolio growth. The remaining provision expense was largely associated with the specific exposure discussed earlier. As a result, cost of risk was 26 basis points compared with 14 basis points in the previous quarter. The quarter also included $8.6 million in write-offs related to two fully reserved commercial loans; because these write-offs were charged against existing allowances they had no additional impact on second quarter results. We also recorded $1.1 million in recoveries from previously written off loans. As a result, total reserves ended the quarter at $93.8 million, providing 1.25% coverage of impaired credit. These actions reflect our proactive approach to credit risk management: identifying potential deterioration early, actively reducing exposure when appropriate and maintaining prudent reserve levels. Together with disciplined underwriting and a well-diversified portfolio, they continue to support a sound asset quality profile. Turning now to funding. Deposits remain one of the quarter's key strengths and continue to serve as a central pillar of our funding strategy. Deposits reached a new high of $7.9 billion at quarter end, increasing 8% from the first quarter and representing approximately 64% of total funding. Our deposit base remains well diversified. Central Bank and Class A shareholders accounted for 34% of deposits, while financial institutions represented 27%; corporations, 23%; brokers, 15%; and multilateral institutions, 1%. DGD balances also reached a new high, ending the quarter at nearly $2 billion. Continued demand reflects the strength of our distribution platform across the Americas, Europe and Asia. During the quarter, we also introduced green Yankee CDs with proceeds allocated to eligible green assets originated by our commercial team. This initiative further broadens our investor base while expanding our sustainable funding alternatives. Beyond deposits, we continue to selectively evaluate medium-term funding opportunities that enhance diversification, extend funding duration and improve overall funding efficiency. Let me now turn to capital. The Basel III Tier 1 ratio in the quarter was 16.6% compared with 17.9% in the first quarter and remains above our 15% to 16% operating range. The regulatory capital adequacy ratio under Panama's framework stood at 14.3%, well above the regulatory minimum. The movement in Tier 1 reflects the continued deployment of capital to support commercial portfolio growth, particularly in medium-term transactions. This is consistent with the strategy we outlined following the AT1 issuance and with our expectations that capital ratios would gradually move toward our operating range as we put the capital to work. Our capital base continues to provide ample capacity to support future growth, absorb potential volatility and maintain the financial flexibility expected by our stakeholders. Moving now to net interest income and margins. Net interest income increased to $73.3 million, up 4% from the first quarter. Higher average loan balances more than offset tighter lending spreads allowing net interest income to grow despite continued pressure on margins. Net interest margin was 2.24% during the quarter, down 10 basis points from the first quarter while net interest spread declined to 1.64%. The decline in NIM primarily reflects higher average liquidity and continued competitive pressure on short-term lending spreads as abundant regional liquidity and strong demand for high-quality assets continue to affect pricing. Against this backdrop, we remain disciplined in our approach to short-term lending, pursuing transactions at tighter spread only where risk-adjusted returns remain attractive. These additional volumes generate incremental net interest income while preserving the flexibility to reprice the portfolio as market conditions evolve. At the same time, medium-term origination with attractive risk-adjusted returns provided an additional earning contribution and helped partially offset the pressure on short-term lending spreads. On the funding side, continued deposit growth increased the contribution of lower cost funding to the balance sheet, partially offsetting the impact of tighter asset spreads. At this time, we are maintaining our full year NIM guidance while continuing to monitor competitive conditions, portfolio repricing and funding costs closely. Let me now turn to noninterest income. One of the key highlights of the quarter and an increasingly important contributor to our financial performance. Noninterest income, excluding the impact of hedging derivatives, reached $25.1 million, up 86% from the first quarter. Within this total, fees and commissions amounted to $23.3 million. Letters of credit and guarantees generated $9.5 million, supported by stronger transaction volumes and increased trade finance activity. The quarter also benefited from the distribution of a letter of credit facility originated by our trade finance team. Credit commitments contributed $5.2 million, providing a stable and recurring source of income, primarily from project finance transactions and medium-term committed facilities. Structuring and distribution generated $7.9 million in upfront structuring and syndication fees. During the quarter, the team completed seven transactions across six countries, supporting both financial institutions and corporate clients. Year-to-date, Bladex has mobilized approximately $2.2 billion while returning only 26% of that volume in our balance sheet, highlighting the capital-efficient nature of this business. Client derivatives generated an additional $1.3 million during the quarter. As Jorge mentioned, the pilot transactions continue to perform well and are primarily linked to structured transactions for our clients. This activity continues to progress in line with the strategy we presented at the Investor Day. As a result, noninterest income, excluding hedging derivatives, represented 25.4% of total revenues reinforcing the diversification of our earnings and underscoring its increasingly meaningful contribution to profitability. Turning now to expenses and efficiency. Operating expenses totaled $23.8 million, up 8% from the first quarter. For the first half, expenses remain in line with our 2026 plan, while revenue growth outpaced expense growth. This generated positive operating leverage and improved the efficiency ratio to 24.1% from 26.5% in the prior quarter. As Jorge noted, expense execution is seasonally weighted towards the second half of the year as strategic initiatives move into implementation. At this time, we continue to expect full year efficiency ratio to remain within our guidance range of 27% to 28%. As we invest, productivity remains a management priority. We are allocating resources selectively with a clear focus on operating leverage and efficiency. In closing, the second quarter demonstrated a strong and balanced execution across the franchise, reinforcing our confidence in the full year outlook and our ability to continue delivering disciplined profitable growth while preserving the strength of our balance sheet. This concludes my review of the second quarter financial results. Back to you.
Thank you, Annette. Let me just close with a few comments on strategy execution, the macro environment and our outlook for the rest of the year. On strategy, the first half of the year provides a good view of how our 2030 plan is beginning to move from design into execution. The commercial growth and revenue diversification pillars are developing in line with the direction we shared at the Investor Day. Transactional services is a little different from the other two pillars. As I mentioned during our Investor Day back in March, this is a longer-term build because it's more intensive in terms of technology, controls, compliance, and general operational readiness before we're able to scale. That said, Phase 1 of the new online banking platform is already in place, and we're gradually adding letters of credit clients. We're also very close to completing the onboarding of two additional corresponding banking clients. In parallel, we remain focused on end-to-end process redesign and automation; the objective here is to make sure we scale this part of the business with the right controls and operating foundations from the beginning. Now turning to the macro environment. The global economy continues to show resilience, but uncertainty undoubtedly remains high. Geopolitical trade tensions, together with renewed inflation risks, continue to create a challenging backdrop for economic activity and financial markets. In the United States, inflation has shown signs of renewed pressure, while the labor market remains relatively strong. As a result, the Federal Reserve has adopted a more cautious tone with rates likely to remain stable for longer. In Latin America, the electoral cycle was an important focus for markets during the quarter, particularly because presidential elections took place in Colombia and Peru. The electoral results eased political uncertainty and boosted market confidence, but investors still concentrate on governance, fiscal performance and policy direction. Overall, regional assets performed well during the quarter, supported by constructive investor sentiment and tighter credit spreads. Looking ahead, our view for the rest of the year remains broadly unchanged. We are encouraged by our execution during the first half of the year and remain on track on the key priorities we established for 2026. At the same time, we are realistic about the environment. Margin pressure has been stronger than we originally expected, mainly due to tight spreads, abundant liquidity and strong competition for high-quality assets in the region. We are managing the pressure through disciplined portfolio growth, funding execution, a broader revenue mix and continued cost control. Given this context, we reiterate our full year guidance. We will continue to manage the business with discipline, maintaining our focus on risks, returns and the quality and sustainability of our earnings. That concludes our review for the second quarter. Operator, you can now open the line for questions.
分析師問答
Our first question comes from Ricardo Buchpiguel with BTG Pactual.
Good morning, everyone. I have a few questions. You commented that the competitive environment became a little more intense in the second quarter of the year, pressuring spreads. I wanted to understand whether you continue to see this trend and if your appetite to grow has changed in any way for the second half of the year, particularly as your guidance now implies a sharp deceleration for the second half. And also, in a way related to these margin checks, if you consider the opportunities that these products bring to improve private relationships and increase noninterest income penetration when you are deciding how much you want to grow per client? And finally, I just wanted to ask about asset quality. The coverage ratio is now closer to 1.2x, a historically low level when you compare it to the numbers since 2020. So I wanted to understand if it makes sense that you expect some pickup in provisions versus what we have been seeing in the last few quarters or perhaps only the NPL formation going down will improve the coverage ratio in the coming quarters?
Thank you, Ricardo. I'm going to tackle the margins question, and then Annette will tackle the asset quality question. Yes, as you said, the margin pressure was stronger than we initially expected. There is no change in appetite, and given our business model and given that we maintain almost 70% of our commercial book maturing in less than a year, times like this of excess liquidity put more pressure on Bladex than on the average bank. On the other hand, the strategic plan was designed exactly to navigate this kind of environment. We have been quite successful in containing much of the compression of the short-term deals through the execution of our core strategy, for example more structured products such as supply chain finance, factoring, accounts receivable financing, commercial prepayments, among others. The proportion of such deals will keep increasing, and we expect to continue growing and alleviate the periods of margin pressures like the one we have now. The same is happening with medium-term transactions. These are syndicated project finance deals that come with a pickup on spread and also with more fees. Finally, on the funding side, that's also helping us contain the NIM since we're gathering more and more deposits as they grow as a percentage of the funding base. Needless to say, as we scale the transactional deposits platform, the contribution of operational deposits to a lower cost of funds will be increasingly meaningful, but that should come in the latter part of the plan. So all in all, there is more pressure on margins than we had expected. We will not change the appetite. But again, repricing should help when conditions change.
That's very clear. I just wanted to understand if you are not changing the credit appetite — why not increase the portfolio guidance, right? You're already growing around 20% this year. I understand that the portfolio has short duration, but I just wanted to understand the idea here.
Yes, good point. We're retaining the guidance until we have better visibility on the second half of the year. There might be upside here. But rest assured, we will not chase volume simply to raise the number.
Our next question is on credit quality.
Ricardo, as we mentioned in the call, credit quality remains very strong in the portfolio. Stage 1 still represents 98% of total exposure with an extremely healthy portfolio. Stage 2 is 1.1% of our credit portfolio. This decrease was mainly due to credit improvement that we saw in this stage, repayments and maturities. As we mentioned, we moved one single exposure from Stage 2 to Stage 3. This exposure corresponds to a single client in the petrochemical sector in Brazil that we already mentioned in prior calls. This movement increased Stage 3 to 0.5% of the portfolio. As we mentioned in the call, this was only a single client. This client had two facilities: one that was a bilateral loan, which was reduced during the quarter, and the remainder, which was a deferred payment, was moved to Stage 3 and remains very well reserved. As a result, we increased provisions by EUR 8.6 million this quarter. Most of this, around EUR 6.4 million, was due to the growth of the portfolio and the total reserve increased to EUR 93 million. Looking ahead, we do not expect nonperforming loans to increase from the current levels. We estimate that the coverage will move from the current 1.25 to around 1.5 to 1.6x towards the end of the year.
Our next question comes from Andres Soto with Santander. Sir, your microphone is open.
I have a quick question. I prefer to go one by one. The first is on loan growth. We saw a significant acceleration in commercial loan growth despite competitive pressures. How much of this growth is reflecting structural gains from new businesses, such as trade finance and structured lending, versus increased market activity in the countries where you operate? And as you look into the second half, do you see room for this robust growth to remain for the rest of the year?
Grace, Andres, on loan growth, I would say it's split fairly evenly between our typical short-term lending, some of it with structured deals, and part of it, around half, was also longer-term type deals, mainly syndications but also some project finance deals in Panama, Argentina and the Dominican Republic. As I said before, there might be upside in our guidance of loan growth, but we're not ready to commit to that yet.
Understood. My second question is on the fee income this quarter, which showed another record level. Can you please help us distinguish how much of this performance can be considered recurring versus one-offs, since I believe there were a few one-offs over the quarter?
Yes. There are three types of fee income here. The syndication deals are difficult to extrapolate for the rest of the year. We had some deals that were expected to close in the first quarter that turned into the second quarter; it's hard to predict timing on those. On the other hand, letters of credit have been steadily growing and progressing according to plan. We're also starting to see, as I mentioned during the call, client derivatives starting to gain traction. So, in short, syndications are less predictable quarter to quarter; the rest is more structural, steady growth. This was an exceptional quarter in terms of fees, and I would not advise simply multiplying this quarter's syndication fees across the rest of the year.
Can you hear me? I just want to add some perspective. One year ago, in Q2 2025, we had the Staatsolie deal in Surinam which was a large historical one-off. As much as we can, we should not multiply one-off revenues by four. The fact that this year, in the first semester, our total fees and structuring fees are equal or above last year without depending on one single deal is important. This quarter we had seven deals, which was a record within a quarter. I'm not saying that is repeatable every quarter, but it shows a direction: less dependency on individual large transactions. Of course, there were exceptional transactions this quarter, for example the acquisition of Banistmo in Panama, where we were one of the co-lenders and that is a representative transaction. But I think the important point is the direction: a bigger balance sheet, more products and closer relationships with clients put us in a better position to continue to grow. Back to you.
Thank you, Samuel. That was very helpful. We had questions on the transactional banking strategic plan. You mentioned that Phase 1 of the online banking platform is operational and you're close to onboarding two additional correspondent banking clients. When should investors expect to see this reflected in improved funding costs in your numbers? It will be in the second part of the plan. We have one correspondent bank working with us; two will join this year; between five and ten will join next year, but the meaningful contribution on cost of funds you'll see in the second part of the plan. That means years four and five, you'll have a meaningful contribution. We are about four months after the Investor Day. Where would I say execution is running ahead or where has it proven more challenging? It's only been four months; we are right on track. We expect to complete the treasury platform by the end of this year, the first part, and then the second part in the first half of next year. Online banking is on track, compliance and monitoring systems are also on track. Today, I cannot say we are ahead nor behind in any of these initiatives related to the transactional services pillar — right on track.
Our next question comes from Ricardo Bris with Mattison. Happy to see increased exposure to Argentina and more recently El Salvador. Can you provide more color on the nature of exposure in these two countries? Is this mainly loans to banks and corporates? In a related note, should we expect to see some exposure in Venezuela in the next few quarters? And congratulations on the continued solid performance.
Thank you for your question. Argentina exposure was mainly in the oil and gas sector and some of it is short-term imports of gas in the winter period. El Salvador exposure is mainly short-term financial sector related. Everything is within our natural course of business. Regarding Venezuela, our position remains unchanged. Venezuela might represent an upside scenario over time, but it's not included anywhere in our current projections and our exposure today is 0. We know the market; it was at some point relevant for Bladex, approximately 5% of our total portfolio a few years ago. We are continuing to assess the appropriate timing and risk-return conditions. If we re-enter, it will be gradual, selective and always consistent with our credit, legal and compliance framework.
Our next question comes from Juan Soto with Bancolombia.
How sensitive is the current credit portfolio to an application slowdown in Latin America trade activity or commodity prices? Operating expenses increased year over year due to the investment in technology, modernization and personnel. When should investors expect these investments to translate into measurable efficiency gains?
I'll talk about the first part on commodities and Latin America, and then Annette will tackle the expenses. We've seen volatility in oil, which is the main commodity that represents a significant part of our portfolio. The net effect of higher oil prices is generally positive for Bladex. Our longer-term exposure is concentrated in competitively low-cost producers, where high prices can strengthen cash flows and reduce credit risk, while higher cargo values can increase demand for short-term trade financing. Overall, this is more of a tailwind than a headwind. Importers may face higher working capital needs and profitability pressure, and severe volatility can tighten financial conditions; however, many importer exposures are strong national oil companies that have been our clients for decades. The short-term tenor of the portfolio allows us to reprice quickly and reposition if needed. We're not seeing any slowdown in the region; on the contrary, we're seeing increased activity. Regarding operating expenses, we are already seeing tangible efficiency gains from investments made since the start of the strategic plan. We have been investing in technology and people. We have bigger teams in the commercial area that are able to originate more sophisticated transactions, which supports fee income growth. We are already seeing the impact in depreciation expense from the trade platform implemented last year, and that is providing additional income to the bank. Trade finance and letter of credit income are increasing organically and allowing us to pursue other transactions such as the restructuring credit facility that supported part of our project finance transactions this quarter. We are already seeing tangible gains and our efficiency ratios remain attractive. Our investment plan is designed throughout the strategy so that the efficiency ratio is always within our guidance range; you should not expect a spike above 30% throughout the plan.
Just to add to that: as we shared at the Investor Day, we do expect the efficiency ratio to be between 27% and 28% towards the end of the year. During the execution of the strategic plan in 2026 and 2027, the efficiency ratio will increase, and then towards the second half of the strategic plan, when we see the most impact from operating deposits, the efficiency ratio will decrease toward the mid-20s.
Okay. Thank you very much. That's all the questions we have for today. I'll pass the line back to the Bladex team for their concluding remarks.
Yes. Thank you all. As I said, this was an excellent quarter with record results. More importantly, we are excited to keep seeing strategy turn into tangible results. Thank you all for your participation, and have a good day. Goodbye now.
This concludes today's conference call. You may now disconnect.