Prior to his appointment as CEO, José Antonio Álvarez served ten years as chief financial officer at Banco Santander.
He got recognition for best industry practices in the areas of investor relations and transparency specifically.
Banco Santander group executive chairman Ana Botín said: "On behalf of the Board, I would like to express our gratitude to Javier Marín, for his great work for Banco Santander for 23 years and especially for his service as CEO.
"During his two years in this role, he has led the commercial transformation of our bank, bringing innovative management to lead our customer segmentation and service improvement initiatives, while also improving our profitability and efficiency".
Following this latest move, several other senior management changes took place and appointments will take effect from 1 January 2015.
This is considered to be the first major shake-up in leadership ever since 54-year-old Ana Botín took over as chairman following her father Emilio Botín’s death.
According to the Wall Street Journal report, Marín had several differences with Ana Botín, who is eager to carve her position as a powerful chairman by transforming the board which Emilio had built up over the last few decades.
Image: Banco Santander appoints José Antonio Álvarez as chief executive officer.
