Jaime Botin, former head of lender Bankinter and a member of the dynasty that has run Spanish multinational bank Santander for more than a century, was found guilty of trafficking culturally important goods and ordered to hand over the artist's Head of a Young Woman which is valued at 26 million euros (NZ$43.6m).
The painting was seized from Botin's yacht in Corsica after he took it there in breach of court orders that it should stay in Spain.
Botin, who is the uncle of Santander Chairman Ana Botin, was sentenced to 18 months in prison and fined 52.4 million euros (NZ$88m) for smuggling a Pablo Picasso painting out of Spain.
Spain has some of the strictest heritage laws in Europe. Any work of art more than 100 years old that is considered culturally important can be deemed a national treasure, forcing owners to obtain a permit before taking it out of the country. Botin was denied such a permit for the Picasso.
Prosecutors argued that Botin was smuggling the painting out of Spain, instructing the captain of his yacht to lie to law enforcement, with the objective of selling it at a London auction house. Botin countered that since the painting had been kept on his yacht, it had never been on Spanish territory and that he therefore had the right to take it to Switzerland for safekeeping, local media reported.
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