António Horta Osório (banker)

António Mota de Sousa Horta Osório (born 28 January 1964) is a Portuguese banker who is Group Chief Executive (CEO) of Lloyds Banking Group.

Early life

Born in Lisbon, he is the elder son of António Lino de Sousa Horta Osório, a lawyer and table tennis champion, and grandson of the late António de Sousa Horta Sarmento Osório, lawyer, economist and politician.

Education

He graduated in Management and Business Administration from the Catholic University of Portugal, Lisbon, in 1987. He received his MBA at INSEAD, Fontainebleau, in 1991, where he was awarded the Henry Ford II prize for the best student in that year.^[2] He completed an Advanced Management Program (AMP) at Harvard Business School in 2003.

Career

He joined Citibank in Portugal, where he became vice president and head of Capital Markets until 1990. During this period, he also taught at the Catholic University of Portugal, where he was an assistant professor, and a guest professor from 1992–1996. He was also a guest professor in the Superior Course of Banking Management at the Portuguese Bank Training Institute (IFB), from 1988 to 1994.

He joined Goldman Sachs in their corporate finance division, in New York City and London, from 1991–1993. In 1993, he was invited by Emilio Botín to join the Santander Group and set up Banco Santander de Negócios in Portugal (BSNP), of which he became CEO. From 1995 to 2003, he served as President of the Association of Alumni of INSEAD in Portugal. In 1998 he became a member of the INSEAD Portuguese Council, and from 2003 to 2007 he was the chairman.

He moved to Brazil and became CEO of Banco Santander Brazil (1997–1999) and chairman of the Santander Group in Brazil (1997–2000). From December 1997, he also became the Executive Chairman of Banco Santander Portugal. With the 1999–2000 agreement between António Champalimaud, the Santander Group and the Caixa Geral de Depósitos, the Santander Group became the owner of Banco Totta & Açores and Crédito Predial Português, adding these to Banco Santander de Negócios and Banco Santander Portugal. Following this, the Group changed its name to Banco Santander Totta.

In 2000, he became Chairman of Banco Santander Totta in Portugal. He also became executive vice president of Banco Santander in Spain and a member of its Management Committee. He joined Abbey National as a non-executive director in November 2004. In August 2006, he moved to the UK and became CEO of Abbey and its successor Santander UK. In 2006, he became chairman of Santander Totta in Portugal. In 2008, he led the integration into the Santander Group of the British building societies Bradford & Bingley and Alliance & Leicester.^[3][4]

He was appointed Non-Executive Director to the Court of the Bank of England in June 2009, relinquishing this position on 28 February 2011. In January 2011 he joined Lloyds Banking Group as an executive director, becoming CEO on 1 March 2011.^[5]

In November 2011, he went on temporary leave from Lloyds Banking Group due to exhaustion,^[6] but as of early December 2011 had announced that he was ready to return to work.^[7] In January 2012, he cited the impact that his leave of absence had on Lloyds as being the reason that he did not wish to receive a bonus for 2011, and also said "As chief executive, I believe my bonus entitlement should reflect the performance of the group".^[8] Under his leadership, the bank's financial performance was turned around, returned to profitability, and it slimmed down to focus on domestic lending and to meet tougher regulatory requirements on the amount of capital it holds.^[9] The Group started down the road to full private ownership, with the Government reducing its stake in September 2013 and March 2014 respectively.^[10] In 2014, Horta-Osório saw his pay increase more than 50 percent to 11.5 million pounds as Lloyds TSB returned to profit.^[11]

Honours and awards

He was made a Commander of the Order of Civil Merit of Spain by his Majesty, the King of Spain, D. Juan Carlos I in August 1998. In October of that year the government of Brazil awarded him the Order of the Southern Cross.^[12]

In June 2009, he was awarded the title of Encomienda de Numero of Orden de Isabel la Catolica (Commander by Number of Order of Isabella the Catholic) by the King of Spain.

In June 2011, he was awarded an Honorary Doctorate from the University of Edinburgh, and in July 2012 he was also awarded an Honorary Doctorate from the University of Bath.

The Portuguese government honoured him with the Order of Merit Grã-Cruz in June 2014, which is the highest Order of Civil Merit.^[13]

António Horta Osório has won the award for the best banker in 2013 by Euromoney after his outstanding work in the British financial institution over the past 2 years and a half. The ceremony was held for the “Euromoney Awards for Excellency”.

António became Chairman of the Wallace Collection in 2015, a Prime Ministerial appointment. The Wallace Collection is one of Europe’s foremost art collections and the greatest private bequest to the nation in Great Britain.

Personal life

He is married with three children, and is a keen tennis player and scuba diver.^[14]

References