Banco del País, S.A.

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What it is

At 31 December 2024, Banpaís held net assets of L 117,563.9 million (~US$4.40 billion), with a net loan book of L 86,318.45 million (~US$3.23 billion) — a 16% jump from the year before. It serves retail customers, small businesses and large corporations across all 17 of Honduras’s departments, also owning an insurance affiliate, Seguros del País, under the umbrella of Grupo Financiero del País.

In commercial lending the bank climbed to third place in the national ranking during 2024, passing one of its main rivals — a striking gain for what was, two decades ago, a mid-tier regional lender. Fitch Ratings assigns it the national long-term rating of AAA(hnd) with a stable outlook — the highest grade on Honduras’s domestic scale, meaning the rating agency sees default risk as negligible by local standards.

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Who owns it

In 2008, Bi Capital Corporation — the Panama-based holding vehicle of Guatemala’s Banco Industrial — acquired a controlling majority of shares in Banco del País and Seguros del País. Banco Industrial is the largest bank in Central America by assets, and its ownership gives Banpaís regional scale, technology and cross-border funding access.

The exact ownership percentage is not disclosed in available sources; the free float is not publicly traded.

The bank’s own annual reports thank “our parent company, Corporación Bi” for its support — confirming that control sits firmly with the Guatemalan group. The Larach family, whose name lives on in the Fundación Napoleón J.

Larach charitable foundation, were the historical founding shareholders before the 2008 acquisition.

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Who runs it

María del Rosario Selman-Housen serves as Presidenta Ejecutiva (chief executive) of Banpaís. She represented the bank publicly at the 2025 Sustainability Report launch, underscoring her role as the face of the institution.

Luis N. Larach Larach and Ricardo E.

Fernández appear among the names associated with the board of directors, as listed in the 2023 annual report.

A CFO or finance director is not named by title in available sources. The bank reports to Corporación BI’s regional governance structure.

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The money, in plain words

Net profit in 2024 was L 1,173.75 million (~US$43.95 million), delivering a return on equity of 14.5% — meaning for every lempira of owners’ capital, the bank earned about 14.5 centavos after tax, solid but noticeably below the 21.8% it earned in 2023. In 2023 the bank had produced L 1,536.5 million in net profit at a return on equity of 21.8% — the 2024 decline of ~23.6% (our calculation) reflects a deliberate capital-building strategy rather than a business deterioration.

The bank proposed retaining 100% of 2024 profits as earned surplus, at the request of the CNBS regulator, to strengthen its capital base. The loan book is clean: non-performing loans were just 0.8% of the portfolio, with reserve coverage of 137% — meaning for every lempira of bad debt, it holds L 1.37 in provisions, well above the system average.

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What it is doing now

In June 2026, the first auction of BANPAIS 2025 Corporate Bonds opened on the Bolsa Centroamericana de Valores — authorised by the CNBS — consolidating the bank’s leadership in Honduras’s domestic capital market. The total offering is US$436 million, the largest corporate bond issuance ever placed in the Honduran securities market.

The proceeds will fund loan growth and refinance existing obligations.

The personal-banking loan book reached L 8,440 million, growing 50% in a single year, propelling the bank to third place in the retail segment ranking. Alongside the Fitch AAA(hnd) rating, the bank received The Banker’s “Bank of the Year — Honduras 2024” award and a gold prize from Fintech Americas 2025 for financial innovation.

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What to watch

• Capital adequacy squeeze. The CNBS demanded 100% profit retention in 2024. If capital requirements tighten further, lending growth — which ran at 16% in 2024 — may have to slow.
• Return on equity trajectory. The drop from 21.8% ROE in 2023 to 14.5% in 2024 is the single number every creditor and potential equity investor should track; a rebound would signal the capital-build phase is complete.
• Bond market execution. The US$436 million issuance is the largest corporate bond in Honduras’s history. Whether it is fully subscribed — and at what rate — will reveal the market’s real confidence in the bank’s credit story.
• Parent-group strategy. Corporación BI’s appetite for further Central American expansion could mean Banpaís is used as a vehicle for acquisitions or cross-border products; watch for any change in ownership structure or related-party transactions.

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This is news, not investment advice.