President Andrés Manuel López Obrador (AMLO) asked this Thursday to "return Banamex to Mexico" after the American Citigroup announced that it will close its retail banking operations in the country, which includes the CitiBanamex brand.
"Hopefully this will turn into something good, it is not bad, but we can turn it into something very good; without authoritarian measures, this bank is Mexicanized, which was owned by Mexicans; since the 19th century the National Bank of Mexico was born, it is one of the most ancient ", declared AMLO in a video from the National Palace.
López Obrador stressed that "there is that possibility, that opportunity, that Mexican investors can stay with Banamex" , an operation that "would leave taxes" and "billions of pesos would enter the Public Treasury.
The President "celebrated" that Mexican magnate Ricardo Salinas Pliego, owner of Banco Azteca, "has expressed his interest in buying it." And he considered that "the same could be thought" of Carlos Slim de Inbursa, Carlos Hank González de Banorte and José Javier Garza Calderón and a group of investors from the northern state of Nuevo León.