Lula demands greater agility from BB and Caixa in releasing credit to app and taxi drivers

The president has complained about the slowness in hiring and demonstrated to allies his dissatisfaction with the performance of public banks in the program.

The government allocated R$30 billion to the so-called Move Brasil Taxi and Applications, which has subsidized rates, but only R$3.55 billion had been released until last Tuesday (18), equivalent to 12% of the total available. The deadline to obtain credit ends on September 15th, the last day of validity of the MP (provisional measure) that created the line.

BB and Caixa are leading the execution, but the low values achieved displease the political core of the government, which was betting on the program to improve Lula's popularity among these groups in an election year.

The government transferred resources to make loans viable, will provide subsidies so that interest rates remain lower than market rates and also provides a guarantee fund, which will honor payments in the event of default - a measure that helps increase banks' appetite by reducing operation risks.

Still, financial institutions face difficulties in releasing credit. According to a member of the sector, even with full government support, many drivers are qualified for the program, but are unable to prove their ability to pay the installments and, therefore, are left without access to credit.

There are also cases in which the interested party has restrictions on their registration, due to old debts or legal proceedings. In these cases, according to the interlocutor, the obstacle becomes practically unavoidable for financial institutions.

The impasse has bothered members of the government. At the beginning of the week, the chief minister of the General Secretariat of the Presidency, Guilherme Boulos, told Folha that banks "have been excessively restrictive in granting credit and should look at these workers with more respect."

Before the meeting with BB and Caixa, Lula told interlocutors that he would have a difficult meeting. According to reports, the conversation was tough, with demands on the presidents of the institutions to speed up the concessions as much as possible.

Boulos also participated in the meeting on Wednesday, as well as ministers Dario Durigan (Finance), Bruno Moretti (Planning), Miriam Belchior (Civil House), Sidônio Palmeira (Communication Secretariat) and vice-president Geraldo Alckmin (PSB).

In addition to the charge to speed up concessions, Lula asked banks to improve service to interested parties and provide detailed explanations in cases where credit is refused. It is a way of trying to placate complaints that appear on social media that institutions deny funding without informing the reason for the rejection.

It was at this same meeting that the government agreed to expand the program, increasing the maximum value of the vehicle to be purchased (from R$150,000 to R$200,000) and including a greater variety of hybrid vehicles.

Banks had also already implemented changes in the calculation of available income, disregarding current expenditures on vehicle rentals in the risk analysis (which would no longer exist, freeing up resources to pay the financing installment) and incorporating the expectation of a drop in fuel expenses in the case of purchasing an electric car.

According to a member of the government, the Executive continues to monitor the execution of the program, and new adjustments are not ruled out.

In banks, there are doubts whether the increase in the maximum financing amount will be enough to boost financing. Today, the average ticket for the program is R$103,000, and some institutions report little demand for vehicles more expensive than R$150,000.

Given the difficulties in getting Move Brasil Táxi e Aplicações off the ground, some of the people involved in the discussions believe that the government may have generated very high expectations by allocating, at the start, R$30 billion for the program - one of the biggest lines of credit launched by Lula this year.

In the view of one interlocutor, the goal set may have proven to be more ambitious than the banks' execution capacity or even the dealerships' delivery capacity. Another factor that weighs in is the drivers' own decision whether or not to take on a debt to exchange or purchase a vehicle.

In addition to paying the financing installments, they will need to bear other costs not covered by the subsidized credit, such as an insurance policy (which also becomes more expensive). Many are still doing the math to decide whether or not to enter the program.

According to reports, the banks have at least R$1 billion in operations already approved, but which have not yet been released because the car manufacturers have not issued an invoice, the qualified driver is still choosing the vehicle or the beneficiary has decided not to contract the operation.

Move Brasil Táxi e Applications has an interest rate set by the CMN (National Monetary Council) at 12.6% per year for men and 11.5% for women. In the market, the average rate for car financing is 28% per year, according to information monitored by the government itself.

At the start of the program, on June 19, dealerships received an unusual volume of app drivers and taxi drivers interested in buying a new car with subsidized interest, but the volume of approvals was low.

Drivers on platforms like Uber and 99 face difficulty accessing the program. They report denials in granting credit and a reduction in their Serasa score after multiple consultations with different banks.

According to the marketing manager of a dealership in Brasília, many drivers believed they would receive credit even with a dirty name,