By Bernardo Caram
BRASILIA (Reuters) – Lending fell significantly in January and led to a decline in the total stock of credit in Brazil, the Central Bank said on Monday, which sees the decline as a seasonal movement unrelated to the crisis. at the American retailer.
Total concessions fell 15.3% in January compared to December, while the stock of credit in Brazil reduced 0.3% in the month, to 5.317 trillion reais. It was the first decrease in the total balance since January last year.
The data was disclosed amid doubts in the market and in the government about risks to the health of the credit system in the country, in the face of the monetary tightening promoted by the BC and fears triggered by the crisis in the Americanas retailer.
However, the head of the Central Bank’s Department of Statistics, Fernando Rocha, stated that the main reductions in the credit balance in Brazil at the beginning of the year occurred in modalities that present a seasonal behavior for companies, although the drop this year has been greater.
According to him, the anticipation of bills, receivables and card invoices traditionally show a reduction in January after an increase in December. These modalities accounted for 77% of the drop in free credit for companies last month, said the technician at a press conference.
“This reduction in the month of January appears to be fundamentally caused by seasonal factors, which indicates that there may be an expansion (of credit to companies) in the following months”, he said, emphasizing that the data accumulated in 12 months should follow a deceleration trajectory of the growth.
According to the BC technician, it is possible that the Americanas case will have an effect on credit, but it is still too early for an eventual impact to be felt, since the first news about the company’s financial problems emerged in January.
“The first announcement of the Americanas case must have happened around January 9, so this impact is still incipient, very initial. What we saw in the January data is that the reduction in credit for legal entities has a strong seasonal character “, he stated.
Rocha stated that the BC carried out an exercise to exclude seasonal factors from the concessions account. Without these atypical items, according to him, a growth of 5.5% was observed in credit concessions in the month.
Last week, the executive secretary of the Ministry of Finance, Gabriel Galípolo, said in an interview with the newspaper O Estado de S. Paulo that the government is focused on avoiding a credit crisis in the country.
DATA WITH SEASONAL EFFECT
In the cut by type of credit, without removing the seasonal effect, the granting of financing with free resources, in which loan conditions are freely negotiated between banks and borrowers, fell 13.9% in relation to December. For operations with earmarked resources, which meet the parameters established by the government, the drop was 27.1% in the period.
Breaking down by type of borrower, total loans to companies dropped 27.1% in the month, while releases to individuals dropped 4.0%.
Total concessions still advance 13.9% in 12 months.
Last month, defaults in the free resources segment stood at 4.5%, against 4.2% in the previous month. In January 2022, it was at 3.3%.
Amidst the monetary tightening promoted by the Central Bank, which has also seen an increase in lending in riskier instruments, average bank rates rose in January.
In January, the interest charged by financial institutions on free credit stood at 43.5%, an increase of 1.8 percentage points in relation to December — there was growth of 8.2 points in 12 months.
In earmarked resources, there was a rise of 0.3 points in the month, to 11.9%, with an increase of 2.2 points in 12 months.
The bank spread, the difference between the bank’s funding cost and the final fee charged to the customer, rose to 30.6 percentage points in free resources, against 28.7 points in December — it was at 24.6% in January 2022 .