BCP sells €80M in NPLs

Portuguese bank BCP is continuing to clear its balance sheet of problematic assets by putting €80 million worth of Non-Performing Loans and properties on the market.

Project Grace includes around €64 million in secured loan defaults and €15 million in real estate assets (REOs), according to sources within the bank led by Miguel Maia.
In an exclusive report by ECO, the bank, which saw profits to September soar seven times the value compared to the same period in 2022 to €650 million, has been particularly active this year. In September it sold €65 million of NPLs from its Project Light portfolio after having sold its position in the Enterprise Restructuring Fund that managed exposures of €70 million from the electrical cable company Cabelte, and its exposure to the Carlos Cardoso da Mota ceramics company.
These sales aim to clean the bank’s balance sheets of toxic assets that weigh heavily on the bank’s capital. By the end of September BCP has a total of €790 million in NPLs and another €1.23Bn in Non-Performing Exposures (NPEs), a reduction of almost €400 million in relation to the same period last year.
However, the bank’s ratio of NPEs decreased in this period from 3.7% to 3%, below what it had expected in its strategic plan.