Grupo Banistmo was a

Panamanian Panamanians (Spanish: ''Panameños'') are people identified with Panama, a transcontinental country in Central America (a region within North America) and South America, whose connection may be residential, legal, historical, or cultural. For mo ...

financial services company, and the largest in

Central America Central America ( es, América Central or ) is a subregion of the Americas. Its boundaries are defined as bordering the United States to the north, Colombia to the south, the Caribbean Sea to the east, and the Pacific Ocean to the west. ...

. It was founded in 1984. In 1999 it began an expansion strategy that has resulted in the acquisition of banks in several Central American countries, as well as

Colombia Colombia (, ; ), officially the Republic of Colombia, is a country in South America with insular regions in North America—near Nicaragua's Caribbean coast—as well as in the Pacific Ocean. The Colombian mainland is bordered by the Car ...

and the

Bahamas The Bahamas (), officially the Commonwealth of The Bahamas, is an island country within the Lucayan Archipelago of the West Indies in the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic. It takes up 97% of the Lucayan Archipelago's land area and is home to ...

. It was the holding company of Primer Banco del Istmo, S.A. or

Banistmo Banistmo is the largest bank in Panama and Central America. It was founded in 1984 as Primer Banco del Istmo before it became part of the HSBC Group following its former parent company, Grupo Banistmo's acquisition by HSBC in November 2006. It was ...

, the largest bank in Panama. Its President and

Chief Executive Officer A chief executive officer (CEO), also known as a central executive officer (CEO), chief administrator officer (CAO) or just chief executive (CE), is one of a number of corporate executives charged with the management of an organization especially ...

was

Alberto Vallarino Alberto is the Romance version of the Latinized form (''Albertus'') of Germanic ''Albert''. It is used in Italian, Portuguese and Spanish. The diminutive forms are ''Albertito'' in Spain or ''Albertico'' in some parts of Latin America, Albertin ...

. In November 2006 it was acquired by

HSBC Holdings plc HSBC Holdings plc is a British multinational universal bank and financial services holding company. It is the largest bank in Europe by total assets ahead of BNP Paribas, with US$2.953 trillion as of December 2021. In 2021, HSBC had $10.8 tril ...

, and merged with HSBC Bank (Panama) S.A., the bank’s existing subsidiary in 2007. In 2013 Bancolombia Group acquired HSBC Panama and renamed it Banistmo.

References

See also