Banco Santander has announced plans to consolidate all its digital services into a single global platform.

The Spanish-headquartered bank revealed the plan as it published results for the first six months of 2019, with attributable profit standing at €3.2 billion, dragged down by €814 million of planned restructuring costs, including €26 million in the UK and a further €80 million for UK PPI provision.

A statement said that the decision to unite all services into the Santander Global Platform comes after a continued acceleration in digital adoption for banking services in the first half of the year, growing to 34.8 million customers, 22 per cent more than the same period in 2018.

The Santander Global Platform unit will include Openbank, Global Payments Services and Digital Assets, which generated combined customer revenues of €48 million during the period - up 18 per cent on a year-on-year - while expenses rose to €108 million, as the bank continued to invest in this area.

Santander said that on average, 240 customers now access one of its mobile or digital platforms every second – an increase of 28 per cent over the past 12 months.

In the UK, underlying profit in the first half stood at €582 million, down 13 per cent due to continued competitive pressure on mortgage margins, a reduction in net fee income and lower gains on financial transactions.

Group executive chairman Ana Botín said: “The bank has delivered its strongest underlying quarterly performance in eight years, reflecting the progress we have made in our commercial and digital transformation.

“During the quarter we have taken a further step forward in our digital transformation with the creation of the Santander Global Platform area, which aligns our reporting structure with our organisation and strategy.”

She added: “This helps ensure that the group’s talent and scale can be leveraged fully by our high-growth digital and payments businesses, helping us offer the best services to retail customers, merchants and SMEs, while also increasing transparency around our digital investments.”

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