Yuri Fernandes: Super clear.
Octavio de Lazari: Thank you very much, and good luck for the results. Thank you, Yuri.
Operator: Next question from Bernardo Guttmann with XP.
Bernardo Guttmann: Good morning. Thanks for taking my two questions. Number one, about portfolio growth. The starting point in the first quarter was low – close to the low part of the guidance. So you would need to accelerate a lot to get close to the top of 5%. So I’d like to understand how do you intend to accelerate this? Do you have a lower appetite and more risky lines? What about corporate? Does it remain challenging? So where will the growth come from? Specifically in what line items? And my second question has to do with the tax reform and the risks of the change. The proposals that have been discussed? And what is your base scenario, particularly regarding IOC? I’d like to have your opinion on this statement how you evaluate the risks?
Octavio de Lazari: Thank you, Bernardo, for the questions. Indeed, growth seems to be challenging. And we wanted to be transparent and fair with you. So it didn’t sense to us to maintain a guidance of 6.5% to 9.5% with a 1.2% growth in our portfolio in the first six months, given the whole outlook, the whole context that we talked about. Nevertheless, we have observed and we have been seeing into new productions that we’ve been doing. Clearly, we’ve had portfolios with the best credit margins. We have 33 million account holders, as we mentioned, in addition to all the people who, one way or another, have a contact with the bank, more than 70 million people. So there is room for us to grow the book, particularly in those operations that are more profitable with the high spread.
And thus, we can accept a little more challenge in delinquency. So in terms of individuals growth, will come from these portfolios. Consumer credit, payable deductible, real estate financing as much as possible. So that’s for individuals. Now, for legal entities, micro and small companies, so the ones that are suffering the most, and that’s where we have the biggest delinquency challenge as we showed in the slides. But still, we have good clients there that we can operate with good secured loans, with — bringing forward the receivables. So there’s room to grow these portfolios as well. And in the wholesale bank, because of our strategic planning, we have a pipeline of the operations for the second half of the year. And we have a very robust pipeline for second half pipeline — or second half of the year for large corporates and legal entities.
And we see more momentum in the operations. This was in July, it’s recent. But in July, we saw more momentum in fixed income and variable income deals. We had some follow-ons that were very successful 2, 3, 4 times the book and with a price discount that was very small. So there’s great expectations. Mainly IPOs that were in the draw, well, they are now coming back. We know, and you’re right, the outlook is challenging. That’s why we revised the guidance from 1% to 5%. If we talk about the mid guidance, we’re talking about 3%. But we’ll work to get at least the midrange of the guidance, but always with an expectation that we might have a higher demand for loan operations. Perhaps we can pursue more loans so that we can get to the top range – the top of the range of the guidance.
Oh and regarding IOC, Bernardo, we practically have nothing. We haven’t got the tax rate yet. We knew about the challenges. We have spoken about this with the government. We have spoken to them about the impact that will have on us, on the banks, but also on the market as a whole. So, there will be a lot of discussion. There will be a lot of meetings, committees will be formed so that we can address this in an adequate way to maintain the levels of profitability and results for our shareholders. But it is a challenge because to-date, we haven’t got anything from Alliance. Nothing was formalized regarding IOC, and nothing was formally submitted regarding IOC. But Bernardo, if probably you have read this. The contact with the government, interactions with the government are very positive, both with Roberto Campus in the Central Bank and Ministry of Finance Haddad.
