BNDES intends to double the granting of financing this year

“We brought a little to our portfolio of projects, which is very strong. We had a 207% growth in new projects that entered the BNDES. And this year the perspective is to finance R$ 50 billion, twice as much as last year”, stated Mercadante after meeting with the Minister of Finance, Fernando Haddad.

According to Mercadante, the BNDES needs new financing instruments to meet the public policies under development, such as the new Growth Acceleration Program, the new industrial policy and the Ecological Transition Package, also called the Green Package.

“There is strong pressure for investment, there is great motivation to invest in this new environment, there is expectation of a drop in interest rates and new financing instruments that accelerate investments”, declared Mercadante. According to him, the bank already financed more exports in the first half of the year than in the whole of last year and increased financing for micro, small and medium-sized companies by 56% this year.

The president of BNDES also announced that, soon, the bank will grant financing for innovation and digitalization linked to the Referential Rate (TR), which will total a maximum of 3% per year. “This should contribute to accelerate industry investments”, he declared. Traditional BNDES financing is restated by the Long Term Rate (TLP), which follows the market price of government bonds linked to inflation.

Climate Fund

Mercadante also announced that the Climate Fund, managed by the bank and which finances ecological transformation actions, will receive an extra R$620 million this semester. The fund finances projects to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and adapt to climate change.

“We are now going to have an increase of around 620 billion reais in the Climate Fund, which is managed by the BNDES and is a fund that Brazil has immense potential to raise funds from abroad, the so-called green bondsgreen funds, which can leverage the ability to finance investment for development,” he commented.

FAT

Mercadante also complained about the deficit of the Fundo de Amparo ao Trabalhador (FAT), one of the main sources of funds for the BNDES. According to government estimates, the Fund should end the year with a deficit of R$ 4.3 billion, even receiving a contribution of R$ 1.7 billion from the Treasury. According to him, Congress needs to resolve the allocation of resources from the fund, which started to allocate part of the resources to Social Security after the approval of the Social Security reform.

“The FAT equation has to go through the National Congress. The FAT was not conceived to finance Social Security”, criticized Mercadante. He said that the BNDES will not reimburse part of the loans granted by the bank with resources from the fund, despite the possibility being foreseen in the legislation.

Created in the 1988 Constitution, the FAT is made up of collections from the Social Integration Program (PIS) and the Civil Servant Asset Formation Program (Pasep). The fund transfers 40% of BNDES resources to reinforce the development bank’s capital to lend to the productive sector. The remaining 60% goes to the Ministry of Labor, which uses the resources to pay salary bonuses, unemployment insurance and carry out professional qualification programs.

Earlier, the Minister of Labor and Employment, Luiz Marinho, met with Haddad and said he was concerned about the expected deficit in the FAT for this year.