López Obrador gives his approval for "the king of copper" Germán Larrea to buy Banamex

With the bid for Banamex in its final stretch, the president of Mexico, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, has declared that he will accept the owner of Grupo México, Germán Larrea, if he wins the race to become the fourth largest bank in the country.

The president has explained that the so-called

meets the requirements that the National Palace has suggested to Citigroup: that it be Mexican capital, be up to date with its tax payments, agree not to fire bank workers and guarantee that the cultural heritage of the financial institution remains in the territory.

Despite the fact that this week, the president used this same lecture to criticize Larrea, the second richest man in Mexico, with a fortune of more than 24.8 billion dollars, assuring that his company had benefited from the previous six-year terms, this Friday has qualified his position.

"We do not veto Mexicans who want to participate [in the bid] and who are up to date with the taxes and as far as I have information, Larrea is up to date with the payment of his taxes," he said this Friday.

In a 180 degree turn with respect to his comments at the beginning of the week in which he slipped the idea that the mining, infrastructure and transport conglomerate had managed to build this business emporium for the favor of the then PRI presidents, Carlos Salinas de Gortari and Ernesto Zedillo, now López Obrador, has praised Larrea as an advantage over his rival –Daniel Becker, from Banco Mifel– that the businessman still does not have a bank and, according to the president, this will guarantee that he will not incur layoffs if he becomes in the next owner of Banamex.

The president briefly indicated that the director of Banco Mifel and current president of the Association of Banks of Mexico, Daniel Becker, also has possibilities in the bid for Banamex.

The president calculated that between 8,000 and 10,000 million pesos will be paid for the purchase process of the financial institution only for taxes.

“Of course they have to pay taxes, depending on the value of the bank,” he added.

The president took advantage of the moment to charge against former PAN president Vicente Fox by assuring that the history of 2001 will not be repeated, when Banamex was sold to the American Citigroup "and they turned it around" so as not to pay taxes for said operation.

Although the final decision on the next owner of Banamex only corresponds to Citigroup, on several occasions the president of Mexico has expressed his opinions on the process, even last August he confessed that it was even considered that the Government acquired part of the bank, however , then this idea was discarded because there was no certainty that the operation could conclude before 2024, that is, before the end of his term.

From the beginning, López Obrador has insisted that the bank must return to the Mexican capital and for this reason he has encouraged an owner from Mexico to buy the financial institution.

“We want [the new owners] to be Mexicans because there are practically no Mexican banks anymore, it is one of the juiciest businesses, that is why it is important that the profits stay here, that they do not take them away and that they pay taxes,” the president concluded. President.

The sale of a bank with more than 23 million customers and more than a thousand branches—valued at more than $10 billion according to analysts—will mean the largest private transaction in the country in more than a decade.

At this moment, in the bid to become the bank with 138 years of history, there are only two bidders left: the millionaire Larrea and the banker Becker.

On the way were the offers of other relevant participants such as Santander, Banorte, Banco Azteca and Grupo Financiero Inbursa.

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