(Bloomberg) — The Brazilian bank Itau Unibanco Holding SA
raised 1.05 billion reais ($408 million) to finance renewable-energy and water-treatment projects.
That’s the most ever raised for renewable energy in Latin
America by a Brazilian bank, the Sao Paulo-based lender said in
an e-mailed statement Tuesday. The funding includes a five-year,
262 million-real loan from International Finance Corp. and a
three-year, 787 million-real loan from Bank of America Corp.,
Mizuho Bank Ltd. and Commerzbank AG.
“There is a big demand for financing renewable energy
projects in Brazil,” Carolina Amaral Camargo, head of
international financial institutions at the bank’s Itau BBA
unit, said in a telephone interview. “We already have a big
pipeline of operations being analyzed by the bank and we are
going to diversify the financing line for many companies.”
Banks in Brazil may increase their financing for clean
power as President Dilma Rousseff pursues policies to reduce
debt and control inflation and the national development bank
BNDES pulls back, according to Marcelo Girao, head of energy for
project finance at Itau BBA.
“BNDES is slowing down in some types of loans, so the
development bank has to find alternatives with other banks,”
Girao said in an interview in Sao Paulo this month. “Commercial
banks will have more exposure to renewable projects, such as
wind parks.”
Bank of America, for example, has set a goal of $50 billion
for green initiatives in the next 10 years, according to the
statement.
Brazil’s monetary council, which includes the finance
minister and central bank president, raised the benchmark
interest rate for loans provided by BNDES to 5.5 percent
starting Jan. 1, from 5 percent.
Girao estimated that as much as 30 percent of long-term
loans approved in the next few years by the development bank,
Banco Nacional de Desenvolvimento Economico & Social, will come
through private banks, a strategy aimed at “risk
diversification.”
To contact the reporter on this story:
Vanessa Dezem in Sao Paulo at
To contact the editors responsible for this story:
Reed Landberg at
Jim Efstathiou Jr., Carlos Caminada