We recently compiled a list of the 13 Best Performing Bank Stocks So Far In 2025. In this article, we are going to take a look at where Banco Santander-Chile (NYSE:BSAC) stands against the other bank stocks.
The banking sector seems to be performing well in 2025 as the economy has been stronger than expected. Banking and financial services companies are taking more chances and investing in growth, especially in AI. At the same time, central banks around the world continue to lower interest rates, which is further helping the banks.
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In December 2024, Seana Smith, the anchor of Yahoo Finance’s morning show, pointed out that it might be a good time to buy bank stocks. Heading into 2025, that was the overwhelming consensus among well-known strategists. The reasons for optimism around bank stocks included a strong economy, expected deregulation under President-elect Donald Trump, attractive stock prices, and lower interest rates.
Brian Belski, Chief Investment Strategist and leader of the Investment Strategy Group at BMO Capital Markets, noted in his 2025 outlook that financial stocks are still “drastically unloved,” despite compelling valuations and strong earnings growth expectations. Aadil Zaman from Wall Street Alliance Group mentioned that the Federal Reserve’s expected drop in interest rates would result in greater investment banking activity.
Another reason for the sky-high enthusiasm was that historically, financial stocks have performed well under Republican administrations because of expectations for looser regulation, which creates a more favorable environment for banks.
Methodology
To compile our list of the 13 best-performing bank stocks so far in 2025, we used the Finviz stock screener to look for bank companies with the best year-to-date performance. We narrowed down our list by looking for the best-performing stocks with a market capitalization of more than $2 billion. The 13 best-performing bank stocks so far in 2025 were then ranked in ascending order based on their year-to-date performance as of February 14, 2025.
Additionally, we mentioned the hedge fund sentiment surrounding the best-performing stocks, which was taken from Insider Monkey’s Q3 2024 database of 900 elite hedge funds.
Why do we care about what hedge funds do? The reason is simple: our research has shown that we can outperform the market by imitating the top stock picks of the best hedge funds. Our quarterly newsletter’s strategy selects 14 small-cap and large-cap stocks every quarter and has returned 275% since May 2014, beating its benchmark by 150 percentage points (see more details here).
An aerial view of a bustling regional banking institution.
Banco Santander-Chile (NYSE:BSAC)
Year-to-Date Performance: 21.65%
Number of Hedge Fund Holders: N/A
Banco Santander-Chile (NYSE:BSAC), a subsidiary of the Santander Group, is the largest bank in Chile in terms of total assets and loans. The bank provides a wide range of commercial and retail banking services, including loans in Chilean pesos and foreign currencies. In addition to its traditional banking operations, Banco Santander-Chile (NYSE:BSAC) offers a range of financial services like financial leasing, advisory services, and investment management. BSAC is one of the best-performing stocks in the banking industry.
Between 2023 and 2026, the company committed to invest more than $450 million in infrastructure and technology. Banco Santander-Chile (NYSE:BSAC) is strategically growing its customer base with a strong focus on digital services. In the fourth quarter of 2024, the company reported a year-over-year increase of 6.4% in total customers. The customer base reached about 4.3 million and more than 2.2 million out of them were digital customers. Digital customers accounted for 88% of the company’s active customers. In current accounts, Banco Santander-Chile (NYSE:BSAC) reported a strong market share of 23.2% as of October 2024. This is driven by the demand for US dollar accounts that can be opened digitally by the company’s customers.
Overall, BSAC ranks 8th on our list of the best-performing bank stocks so far in 2025. While we acknowledge the potential of BSAC as an investment, our conviction lies in the belief that some AI stocks hold greater promise for delivering higher returns and doing so within a shorter time frame. If you are looking for an AI stock that is more promising than BSAC but that trades at less than 5 times its earnings, check out our report about the cheapest AI stock.
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Disclosure: None. This article is originally published at Insider Monkey.
