Note published on April 18 in El Universal, Cartera [Portfolio] Section by the Editorial Department.
Record profits due to the rise in interest rates and the reform that eliminated outsourcing in Mexico are factors that will generate outstanding employee profit sharing for bank employees on the 2022 fiscal year profits of the groups that they work at, experts foresee.
Manuel Fuentes, labor analyst and member of the faculty of the Azcapotzalco UAM, explained that many workers of the banking sector are experiencing employee profit sharing for the first time.
“What is yet to be seen now in this scenario is what the ratio will be, but the fact that there could be a ratio at the level of one month, two months of salary is good news for the workers”, he explained.
The increase in employee profit sharing and a greater benefit for bank employees occurred since last year.
For example, Banorte reported a total of 772 million pesos for this item at the close of the first semester of 2022; that is, an increase of 151% in comparison with the same period of the previous year, which had an impact on its non-financial expenditures.
“In the biannual comparison, expenses expand 7%, despite inflation pressure, evidencing a significant containment at the institutional level”, says the financial report of the Firm corresponding to the second quarter of 2022.
“Expansion in comparison to the first semester is due to an increased Employee Participation in Company Profits (PTU) deriving from the change in methodology due to the labor reform”, he added.
For its part, CitiBanamex emphasized that, as every year, it will pay the corresponding employee profit sharing to its collaborators.
“CitiBanamex is the financial institution with the longest tradition and consistency in offering the highest employee profit sharing, representing over 50% of this payment in the industry”, said the fourth largest financial group in the country.
It is worth recalling that in 2022, the 51 banks operating in Mexico reached profits of 236 billion pesos, an annual increase of 30%, after benefiting from the high interest rates and a good credit behavior in the country.
This trend has been maintained at the start of 2023. As of February, the CNBV (National Banking and Securities Commission) reported that the institutions reached profits of 43 thousand 266 million pesos, an increase of 19.1% in comparison to the same period last year.
Before the implementation of the reform on outsourcing in 2021, over 40% of bank employees operated under this third-party hiring scheme, which limited the benefits received from the financial institutions.
At the end of last February, the CNBV reported 234 thousand 342 employees hired by the banks, that is, an increase of 9 thousand 756 positions versus the same period of last year. Meanwhile 30 thousand 772 hundred employees hired by a third party are reported.
A juicy employee profit sharing is foreseen for bank employees
In accordance with Óscar de la Vega, managing partner of the De la Vega & Martínez Rojas Firm, a Firm that provides legal services in labor matters, since the elimination of outsourcing, companies have had to reorganize their operations in Mexico.
The foregoing forced banks to transfer personnel to the direct hiring mode, which has caused the homologation of benefits and a sense of permanence for workers in relation to financial institutions.
“The topic of the PTU is the most important one. Institutions have had good results in 2022 and, therefore, they will have to share profits”, he said.
“However, during the course of the negotiation conducted with the business sector, a ceiling was set, establishing the payment of PTU at three months of salary or the average of three years that have been generated by the workers.”
Fuentes recalled that, in the case of bank employees, the topic of unions is limited, as they are not under a collective hiring scheme that allows them to obtain a better distribution of this profit.
