Credicorp Ltd.

What it is

Credicorp is the parent company that owns Peru’s leading financial businesses under one roof. It is the leading financial services holding company in Peru, with a presence in Chile, Colombia and Bolivia, organised into four lines: universal banking through Banco de Crédito del Perú (BCP), microfinance through Mibanco, insurance and pensions through Grupo Pacífico and Prima AFP, and investment banking and wealth management through Credicorp Capital.

The crown jewel is BCP, the country’s biggest bank. As of December 2025 it held about a 33% share of all loans and 36% of all deposits in Peru.

Who owns it

No single owner controls Credicorp; most of it trades freely on the stock market. Credicorp is neither directly nor indirectly controlled by another corporation or by any foreign government.

The founding Romero family remains the anchor shareholder. Filings as of end-2023 showed the family’s holding vehicle, Atlantic Security Holding Corporation, and the family together holding roughly 28% combined, with large US funds Dodge & Cox and BlackRock as the next biggest holders.

Each share carries one vote, including those held by Atlantic Security Holding Corporation – so the family’s sway comes through board seats, not extra voting power.

Who runs it

Gianfranco Ferrari has been CEO since January 2022, after working at the group since 1995. The board chair is Luis Enrique Romero Belismelis, of the founding family.

The finance chief is Alejandro Pérez-Reyes. As CFO, he highlighted the group’s ability to generate record revenue despite a challenging environment.

The money, in plain words

2024 was a record year. Net income for 2024 rose 13.1% to a record S/5,501 million (US$5.5 bn), with a return on equity of 16.5%.

That return on equity means that for every 100 soles owners have invested, the group earned about 16.5 back in a year – solid for a bank. Annual revenue for 2024 was about US$7.0 billion, up roughly 7% from 2023 (our calculation: net margin near 21 cents of profit per real of revenue).

A bank’s engine is the gap between what it earns on loans and pays on deposits. That margin stayed resilient at 6.4%, supported by a low-cost funding advantage – cheap deposits keep its costs down.

What it is doing now

The big bet is Yape, its free phone-payments app, now its main growth story. Yape registered 13.7 million monthly active users, representing 69% of the economically active population.

Once a free service, the app is starting to pay its way. Yape reached breakeven in 2024.

Management is steering more profit toward digital. By 2026, it expects 10% of net income from provisions to come from disruptive initiatives.

What to watch

Peru’s economy and politics drive results. Peru saw a slow recovery in 2024, with its fiscal deficit at the highest in three decades excluding the pandemic.

A tax fight is also live. In June 2025, Credicorp took legal action in a tax dispute with the national tax authority SUNAT.

The key gauge to follow is return on equity. For 2025, the group expects a return on equity of around 17.5%.

This is news, not investment advice.