BBVA Provincial ( BVC
BPV
(formerly BBVA Banco Provincial) is a financial institution in

Venezuela Venezuela, officially the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela, is a country on the northern coast of South America, consisting of a continental landmass and many Federal Dependencies of Venezuela, islands and islets in the Caribbean Sea. It com ...

History

Founded on October 15, 1953, in

Caracas Caracas ( , ), officially Santiago de León de Caracas (CCS), is the capital and largest city of Venezuela, and the center of the Metropolitan Region of Caracas (or Greater Caracas). Caracas is located along the Guaire River in the northern p ...

, as Banco Provincial with a capital of Bs. 15,000,000. In November 1996, Banco Provincial became the first universal bank in Venezuela by expanding its business objectives to include activities of specialized banking. In 1997,

Spain Spain, or the Kingdom of Spain, is a country in Southern Europe, Southern and Western Europe with territories in North Africa. Featuring the Punta de Tarifa, southernmost point of continental Europe, it is the largest country in Southern Eur ...

’s ''Banco Bilbao Vizcaya'' (now

Banco Bilbao Vizcaya Argentaria Banco Bilbao Vizcaya Argentaria, S.A. (), better known by its initialism BBVA, is a Spanish multinational financial services company based in Bilbao, with operative offices in Madrid. It is one of the largest financial institutions in the world, ...

) acquired the majority of shares as a strategy of expansion into

Latin America Latin America is the cultural region of the Americas where Romance languages are predominantly spoken, primarily Spanish language, Spanish and Portuguese language, Portuguese. Latin America is defined according to cultural identity, not geogr ...

. BBVA's entry in Venezuela coincided with Hugo Chávez' presidential election. Once

Nicolás Maduro Nicolás Maduro Moros (; born 23 November 1962) is a Venezuelan politician and former union leader serving as the 53rd president of Venezuela since 2013. Previously, he was the 24th Vice President of Venezuela, vice president from 2012 to 20 ...

came to power in Venezuela, the bank's benefits dropped from 369 million euros in 2013 to -13 million euros in 2017. While

Banco Santander Banco Santander S.A. trading as Santander Group ( , , ), is a Spanish multinational financial services company based in Santander, with operative offices in Madrid. Additionally, Santander maintains a presence in most global financial centres ...

shut its Venezuelan operations in 2009, BBVA chose to maintain theirs despite the

economic crisis A financial crisis is any of a broad variety of situations in which some financial assets suddenly lose a large part of their nominal value. In the 19th and early 20th centuries, many financial crises were associated with banking panics, and ma ...

References

External links

Official site (Spanish)

BBVA official site (Spanish)
Banks of Venezuela Banco Bilbao Vizcaya Argentaria Banks established in 1953 Companies listed on the Caracas Stock Exchange Companies in the Índice Bursátil de Capitalización Venezuelan companies established in 1953 Venezuelan brands Companies based in Caracas Venezuelan subsidiaries of foreign companies {{Venezuela-company-stub