Costa Rica Co-op Merger Concentrates Financial Power

Delegates from Coopenae and CoopeAnde approved a merger on 17 October 2026. The deal would dissolve CoopeAnde as a legal entity and put Coopenae in control of the combined organization. Delegates voted in separate extraordinary assemblies, but the cooperatives didn’t publish vote counts or attendance figures. Regulatory and competition approvals are still required.

A merger decided by delegates, cleared by regulators

The assemblies took place at the Costa Rica Convention Center. Reports said officials announced the result after 5 p.m. The institution’s final shape now depends on the delegates’ decision and reviews by Sugef, which supervises the financial system, and Coprocom, the competition commission.

The cooperatives must formally submit their request to Sugef. Sugef will review the plan and send it to Conassif, the national council that supervises the financial system. Neither an approval nor a decision date has been published, and Sugef said both organizations remain under separate supervision until it makes a final decision.

Coopenae general manager Adrián Álvarez told El Financiero he expected the cooperatives to meet regulatory requirements by December 2026. The organizations said the stages should finish before year-end, but regulators haven’t committed to that timetable. Álvarez called the delegate vote “a concrete step” toward consolidation and said the cooperatives would proceed responsibly through the regulatory stages.

CoopeAnde general manager Alexandra Márquez Massino said the decision reflected a long-term vision in response to technological change. The managers identified scale and competitiveness as their aims, but the sources didn’t point to one specific trigger for the merger. The case for the institutions is clear; vote totals and the filing date remain unknown.

The numbers behind consolidation

Sugef’s July 2026 figures put Coopenae’s assets at 948.2 billion colones, about US$2.09 billion. CoopeAnde held 674.2 billion colones, about US$1.49 billion. Together, the organizations would have about 1.62 trillion colones, or about US$3.58 billion, in assets and operate under the Coopenae brand.

El Financiero said the combined group would become Costa Rica’s fourth-largest private financial intermediary, ahead of Banco Promérica, with 1.35 trillion colones in assets, and Grupo Mutual, with 1.06 trillion colones. La Nación used figures dated 1 August and rounded the combined total to about 1.6 trillion colones, or about US$3.5 billion. The main figures here come from Sugef’s July data; dollar values use the central bank’s reference selling rate of 453.48 colones per U.S. dollar on 18 October 2026.

The combined loan portfolio totals 1.09 trillion colones, about US$2.40 billion. Managers said deposits and obligations would transfer to Coopenae on the originally agreed terms, including term and interest rate, while loans would keep their agreed conditions. Members can keep their current products, services and contracts while approvals remain pending.

Promises, unsettled plans

Audited 2025 accounts show member share capital of 100.2 billion colones at Coopenae and 85.6 billion colones at CoopeAnde. Álvarez said CoopeAnde members’ share capital was intended to pass “intact” to Coopenae, with each member’s seniority and assembly rights unchanged.

Together, the cooperatives have 1,235 direct employees and operate 38 branches. Álvarez said most staff would remain, though the headcount wouldn’t stay exactly the same. Officials will decide the branch plan after approval because some branches sit close together. The staffing plan remains unsettled too.

Álvarez would remain Coopenae’s general manager. Márquez Massino was expected to advise on integration, but the cooperatives haven’t specified her longer-term role. The managers said the larger group could fund technology and corporate-governance investment and meet tougher regulatory demands. Coopenae’s manager estimated that matching the same market share on its own could take 10 to 15 years. The expected timetable, branch decisions and job changes all depend on stages still ahead.