Fruit exports doing fine, in spite of pandemic

Brazilian fruit exports have been resisting the pandemic’s fallout and are up 2.8% in volume through October from the same period of 2019. Revenues fell 1.9%, to $577 million, partly because of currency oscillations. Shipments slowed down a little in October, but are expected to pick up with greater demand for healthy fruits and the bulk of the lemon, melon and mango crops coming to market. Those are Brazil’s top fruit exports, which go mostly to Europe.

Source: Valor International

https://www.valor.com.br/international/briefs

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Itaú’s Kinea unit plans new fund to bet on post-covid consolidations

Kinea, Itaú Unibanco’s alternative investment arm, intends to raise R$1.5 billion to R$2 billion early next year for a new private-equity firm meant to invest in companies that may become consolidators after the worst period of the pandemic. It intends to buy minority stake in cyclical companies, but has not yet defined the sectors. Kinea manages R$3.5 billion in private-equity funds. Its latest fund, raised in 2018, focused on healthcare, education and technology. Now the firm plans to widen the scope.

Source: Valor International

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Cloud solutions company Tivit is shopping for startups

Tivit, Brazilian company focused on cloud computing and data center services, created an investment arm to buy software as a service (SaaS) companies. Tivit Ventures has R$400 million to invest until 2025, starting with the acquisition of ten startups next year. The acquired startups will receive support in areas like finance, human resources, marketing and sales staff in ten countries in Latin America. Tivit expects to close 2020 with revenues of R$2 billion, 8% more than in 2019. “With the pandemic, a lot of people are looking for migration to the cloud and security services,” says Eduardo Sodero, director of strategy, mergers and acquisitions at Tivit.

Source: Valor International

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Enel to invest €5bn in renewable power generation in Brazil by 2023

Enel plans to invest more than €5 billion in Brazil between 2021 and 2023, mainly in opportunities in the renewable power generation and distribution segments. The amount, presented Tuesday in the annual meeting with investors, accounts for nearly half of what the Italian group expects to inject in all Latin America — it also operates in Argentina, Chile, Peru and Colombia. CEO Francesco Starace says the company sees room to expand in distribution in the country despite the relevant footprint it already has. The executive says Enel will actively study any asset put on sale. “Not all biddings will be interesting, either because of the position [of the distributor] in the country or the seller’s unrealistic expectation,” he said. The company has been rumored as a potential contender in the bidding of Companhia Energética de Brasília’s (CEB) power distributor, scheduled for December 4. The pipeline of privatizations also includes a concessionaire of Rio Grande do Sul-based state-owned CEEE and Amapá-based CEA.

Source: Valor International

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Issuance of stocks exceeds R$101bn in 2020

The Brazilian capital market is in an atypical year and not because of the pandemic. The volume raised through stock issuance further expanded this month the record reached in October, data from exchange B3 and Anbima, the association of securities firms, show. Capital raising through equities surpassed R$101 billion in 2020, which means it exceeds in R$11.4 billion the volume obtained in full 2019. Excluding 2010, when Petrobras raised R$120 billion in a one-off event, variable income emissions in 2020 also exceed R$100 billion for the first time. A decade ago, apart from the oil company’s transaction, the Brazilian companies raised just under R$30 billion in the domestic stock market. This year’s figure will grow even more as Rede D’Or’s IPO, which is in the pricing stage, should raise R$12 billion.

Source: Valor International

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MGC buys Credigy, becomes 3rd largest in distressed credit in Brazil

MGC Holding, specialized in credit recovery, will become the third largest in the sector in Brazil with the acquisition of Credigy Brasil, distressed credit subsidiary of the National Bank of Canada. Eduardo Martins, partner in the Brazilian group, says that with the acquisition the holding company now has R$40 billion in credit rights and 19 million contracts. The portfolio also makes the house the largest independent manager, that is, not linked to banks, of stressed consumer assets in the country. MGC does not disclose transaction values due to restrictions by the Canadian regulator, but Mr. Martins considers it to be in line with recent transactions. In 2016, Itaú Unibanco acquired 89.08% of Recovery for R$640 million. With the purchase, the bank obtained a portfolio of R$38 billion in face value at the time.

Source: Valor International

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Splenda wins Petrobras bid and takes over Port of Imbetiba

Splenda Port won a bid from oil giant Petrobras and will operate from this month the Port of Imbetiba, in Macaé, an oil-and-gas town in Rio de Janeiro. The contract marks the company’s new move to expand in logistic support to the activities of oil and gas after taking over the concession of the Port Terminal of Angra dos Reis (TPAR) earlier this year. Founded in 2017, Splenda has R$25 million of capital. Paulo Narcélio, a former president of OGX, is the main partner. He told Valor that the intention is to seek a new strategic or financial partner in the future to back investments in the company’s expansion. The company has signed a 42-month contract with Petrobras to provide port operation services in Imbetiba. The unit provides support to the state-owned company’s exploration and production activities in the Campos Basin.

Source: Valor International

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Judge orders removal of Aneel directors after power outage in Amapá

A federal court ordered the removal of the directors of the Brazilian Electricity Regulatory Agency (Aneel) and the Operator of the National Electricity System (ONS) due to the power supply crisis that has hit the state of Amapá since November 3. The removal is temporary, for 30 days, so that the current directors “do not interfere in investigations” on who is to blame for the blackout. In the sentence, Judge João Bosco Costa Soares da Silva, of the 2nd Civil Federal Court of Amapá, calls “negligent” Aneel, ONS and Linhas de Macapá Transmissora de Energia (LMTE), which runs the main network infrastructure that supplies the state. The judge cited the urgent need to repair one of the three power transformers in the Macapá since last year. For him, the lack of competent management of the Brazilian electricity system caused the problems in the northern state.

Source: Valor International

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GPA to expand digital operation to compete with e-commerce leaders

GPA, owner of supermarket chains Pão de Açúcar, Extra and Assaí, is accelerating its digital initiatives in 2021. The company is going to start offering logistic services to retailers in its marketplace and will launch a digital wallet. The move comes after e-commerce leaders like B2W, Magazine Luiza, Amazon and Mercado Libre sold more during the pandemic than supermarkets. Magazine Luiza said recently that the food segment is the one with most growth in the company and that it is already stocking supermarket items in its stores to fulfill online orders.

Source: Valor International

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Pátria invests R$3bn in wireless networks

Fiber-optic and data centers firm Pátria Investmentos doubled its bet in the data segment with the launching of Winity, a telecom infrastructure company which plans to invest R$3 billion mainly in wireless networks. The forecast is that the Brazilian market will demand at least R$30 billion in infrastructure investment in the coming years, driven by the growing data consumption and the expansion of 4G and 5G technologies, says Winity’s CEO, Sergio Bekeierman. “We identified a big bottleneck, a latent demand. We are going to invest not only in towers, but in radios, equipment, antennas and complete infrastructure solutions,” he says.

Source: Valor International

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