Emilio Botín had an eye for a deal, says Lloyds boss

I remember vividly the day Ana Patricia and I went to him to present our conclusions for how to expand into Brazil. This was a few months after he had asked me to take charge of the country, running it alongside the business in Portugal.

Our proposal was to buy a small bank in São Paulo, with a full balance sheet guarantee from its owners (the Camargo Correa family). The idea was that we could use this foray into Brazil to learn more about the local market, and then expand further in the future if things went well.

He was unsure, given the risks that an emerging market like Brazil represented then. We discussed a range of different options and the risks these entailed. Emilio received contrary advice from other advisers, leading to a challenging debate. Ultimately he agreed with the proposed approach, and we began the expansion into Brazil in 1997.

Now, 17 years later, thanks to Emilio’s leadership, wisdom and determination, Santander is by some margin the largest foreign bank in Brazil, with assets of more than $190bn (£117bn), and Brazil has become one of the largest contributors of profit to the overall group.

Throughout his career, Emilio demonstrated his shrewdness and eye for a deal time and time again: from the bank’s successful entry into the UK in 2004 with the acquisition of Abbey National and the subsequent purchases of Alliance & Leicester and the deposit business of Bradford & Bingley in the midst of the financial crisis; to the participation in the consortium of banks buying ABN Amro, which saw Santander acquire another Brazilian bank and “flip” sell the Italian bank Antonveneta at a significant profit. These deals will, I’m sure, be studied and admired by business students for years to come.

I worked under Emilio’s tutelage, developing the bank’s businesses in Portugal, Brazil and the UK. It was Emilio’s vision to become a truly international bank. I’m honoured and proud that he trusted me to play a part in making that a reality.

Apart from having taken Santander from being the sixth-largest Spanish bank to being the largest in the eurozone by market capitalisation, for which his vision, drive and deal shrewdness were critical, he had powerful charisma and a persuasive leadership style.

He could be as focused on a big acquisition as he could on the details of day-to-day branch banking. He would often quiz branch managers about the position of the branch signage outside or how many current accounts they had opened that day.

In receiving an award for the bank in 2009, Emilio paraphrased Rudyard Kipling’s famous poem If. I always felt that was a poem entirely appropriate for Emilio as a man who “could walk with kings” but always kept “the common touch”. He would never leave a letter, memo or email unanswered and would always return any phone call.

He had relentless drive and energy, often visiting local branches and far-flung foreign subsidiaries, all of which helped to drive engagement and motivation in the organisation and embed a cohesive culture throughout a period of substantial expansion of the bank. In the end, Emilio was a man totally devoted to the bank. He always put the bank’s interests first. He worked on Sundays and had an apartment in the bank’s campus headquarters in Boadilla on the outskirts of Madrid. The bank almost became his “raison d’être”.

I’ve said several times to friends over the years that, in my opinion, Emilio would never retire. He would want to die in service.

Even here, he realised his wishes, passing away peacefully in his sleep. He will be rightfully remembered for many years to come as one of the outstanding bankers of his generation.

Antonio Horta Osorio is chief executive of Lloyds Banking Group

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