The average interest rate in Brazil for loans rose 2.2 points in October compared to September, reaching 32.8% per year — the highest level since the beginning of the coronavirus crisis, when this percentage reached 33.3% per year. year.
The data were released by the Central Bank this Friday (26).
In the year, the increase observed is 7.3 points. The data refer to the free resources segment, in which the cost of financing is freely established by financial institutions.
According to BC data, delinquency in the same segment was stable in October compared to September, with an increase of only 0.1 point since December 2020, at 3%.
The rise in credit is against the backdrop of the monetary tightening cycle conducted by the BC to tame persistent and increasingly widespread inflation.
The basic interest rate (Selic), which started the year at a historic low of 2%, has already risen 5.75 points, to the current level of 7.75%.
The perspective is that it will end the year at an even higher level after the BC signaled at the end of October that it foresees another adjustment of 1.5 points at the next Copom meeting, in December, as part of a process to place it in “significantly contractionary” territory “, in which it acts to cool the economy.
BC officials have stressed that monetary tightening is necessary to promote the anchoring of inflation expectations, which have been moving further and further away from the 2022 target.
Given the picture, many economists have been pointing out the higher cost of credit next year as a factor that will play against the expansion of Gross Domestic Product (GDP).
According to BC data, the banking spread in the free resources segment rose to 23.1 percentage points in October, from 21.7 points in September, up 2.2 points in the year.
Looking at individuals, BC stated that the highlight in the rise in average interest over the previous month was for non-payroll-deductible personal credit (up 6.2 points) and revolving credit card (up 4.1 points).
In the first ten months of the year, the biggest increases were in credit card installments (23.7 points, at 172.6% per year), revolving credit card (15.8 points, at 343.6% per year) ) and overdraft (13.2 points, at 128.8% per year).
The revolving credit card rate even reached the highest level since August 2017, when it was 392.3% per year.
CREDIT GROWTH
Despite the more expensive credit, the trajectory of the stock continues to expand. The general growth was 1.5% in October over September, to R$ 4.497 trillion, corresponding to 53.2% of GDP.
In the year, the stock of credit in Brazil rose 11.8% and, in 12 months, 16%.
In the segment of free resources, the increase was 1.7% in October and 13.8% in the year, while in the segment of earmarked resources the increase was 1.2% and 9.2%, respectively.
At the end of September, the BC estimated that the general credit expansion in 2021 would be 12.6%, driven by the 15.7% expansion in free credit.
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