speaker
Marcelo Noronha
President & CEO, Bradesco

Hello, good morning everyone. I am Marcelo Noronha. I'm here to present the results for the first quarter of 2024 of Bradesco. I'm here live speaking from Cidade de Deus, the City of God. It's 10.31 a.m. It's a great pleasure to be with you once again. And before we start the presentation, I would like to say that unlike what we did in February when I started presenting the strategy in a more, you know, lengthier way, the idea here is not to present a strategy in so many details again, But we will summarize everything, and then we will revisit some of the topics as the questions pop up. And so I will talk throughout the presentation about what we delivered in addition to the members related to the first quarter. And I'm sure I think you have the opportunity to take a look at the members since we posted the presentations and the release after 6 a.m. Our net income, recurring net income was $4.2 billion. It was flat in relation to the previous quarter, but 46% better than the last quarter of 23. And there are some points of attention here that are highlights of our balance sheet. Some are challenging and some other topics relate to good deliveries that we've been doing. First, the improvement in ALL for both retail and wholesale that also leads to an improvement of our NPL. that is improving in all segments. We also increase loan in all segments. I think there is a colleague from the sales side that last quarter asked me a question. He said, do you think you would resume traction? And you will see through another chart that I'm about to show you that there is an inflection in that total loan portfolio. And that's what we will show you. We will show you growth in all long segments with traction. And this is just to answer that question from the previous quarter. Well, the challenge is the gross client NII, but there is a justification for that, and that justification is in our guidance. We have the loan book, and then the margin follows suit. And I will talk a little bit more about it when I talk about the loan book and the guidance. Another topic which is very satisfactory is the control of operating expenses, which grew 4.4%, as we will see, and a very sound performance of the Bradesco insurance business. In all lines, we had a solid performance. So the results for the first quarter was 4.2 billion BRLs, very much in line with what we intend to deliver this year. And as I said before, step by step we will gradually grow. And I know that my clients on the sales side, in particular those that have been analyzing as they can look at the presentation from the last quarter of 2023 and then take a look at everything I'm about to tell you and run a comparison with what we talked about the previous quarter. Therefore, our loan portfolio reached almost $890 billion. We grew 1.2% year on year. And looking at the quarter alone, and the quarter says that we are growing steadily. We grew 1.4% quarter on quarter. The inflection of the curve saying that in the last two quarters, the portfolio was coming down, but now it was falling. with Dick Klein, and now we are resuming growth. If we look at the free portfolio, if we were to look at the presentation from the previous quarter, you will see that traction now is much better based on the KPIs that we showed you in the previous quarter. Looking at individual's portfolio, we grew year-on-year 2% and 1.9% quarter-on-quarter, but this growth is well spread. Some portfolios give us a pretty good balance. and there are other portfolios where we have to grow products with higher margins, but we are getting there. Payroll loans, we grew 4%, 2.1% growth quarter-in-quarter. Mortgage loan or real estate, I think we are probably the largest private bank to deliver growth, 5.8% year-on-year and 1.8% quarter-in-quarter. Credit card, we did grow. The risk was higher, but we're... is that we are not growing. We are not growing in non-account holders. When we look at prime banking, we posted almost 12% growth when we look at the credit card in the high-income segment. Personal loan, 10.1% growth quarter-in-quarter, 1.8% year-in-year. Vehicles also. And real credit, the lines that are more secure

speaker
André Carvalho
Investor Relations Officer, Bradesco

These are lines that are long-term lines, but at the same time, they carry smaller margins.

speaker
Marcelo Noronha
President & CEO, Bradesco

Now, looking at SMEs or companies, in wholesale banks, large companies, we grew 1.6%, and SMEs, micro, small, and mid-sized companies, We are beginning to see more traction, so we grew 2.3% quarter-on-quarter, but I will elaborate further on SMEs later on. Something new that I am now bringing to you is an example of the vintages, vintages for meth. Individuals or individuals mass market. So we started with 100 back in 2019 and look at the second quarter of 2022. The vintages that we have been acquiring, that's the blue line starting with the base of 100. But the bar in... gray means origination for 2019 so so origination for individuals mass market you know and this is again answering the question that you asked it back in the third quarter what about the mass market this is proof of our principality meaning We are increasingly bringing better ratings, even in mass market, and this is proof of what we are saying. I'm talking about vintages over 30, etc. With time, we are not going to see, you know, vintages being right here. They will be slightly above because we will get into products that carry a bit more risk, but they also lead to better margins. Here we have to the right, you know, payroll loans, installments, finance. Cards alone is the only line that is not growing. And I already explained, and that was due to non-account holders, clients that come from OpenSea and from the digital segment. But delinquency is coming down, and this is due to the quality of the collection service we are now providing. And now let's look at SMEs. I am exclusively talking about SMEs. starting with the base of 100, but look at the quality of the vintages. In terms of SMEs or companies, the bars have not yet reached the levels of 2019 because we're being more conservative. Now, I would like to highlight a few lines of growth, but there are some lines that we're not growing as much because of the risk involved. This, today, is a segment that presents the highest credit risk, but Nevertheless, we continue to grow, and this certainly explains why we haven't yet increased in the total NII. Now you see delinquency levels falling, and soon I will talk about the net margin.

speaker
André Carvalho
Investor Relations Officer, Bradesco

So this is NII.

speaker
Marcelo Noronha
President & CEO, Bradesco

You already look at the KPIs, and this is a snapshot of our portfolio. When you look at this column that is available, for you to look at, you look at how much we grow in terms of portfolios that are safer within our portfolio. And now we also leverage credit to these other two lines here.

speaker
André Carvalho
Investor Relations Officer, Bradesco

So the loan portfolio comes first, and then that's followed by the margin.

speaker
Marcelo Noronha
President & CEO, Bradesco

According to our expectation, this is what we expect to see throughout the year, that market NII goes down. So client NII is coming down, but when we look at the net client NII, look at the relative numbers. you know, where we were and where we stand today. So risk appetite is different. Therefore, we have new credit models. We have new credit policies. We are using a lot of machine learning in our... credit segment with our team.

speaker
André Carvalho
Investor Relations Officer, Bradesco

Therefore, the quality of the risk is being monitored very closely, starting with FPD to control all of our portfolios.

speaker
Marcelo Noronha
President & CEO, Bradesco

We are very much grounded. And then you could see that we gained market share in February when compared to the central bank portfolio is not the expanded portfolio because the central bank does not disclose that. But I can tell you with a very good degree of certainty that we gained share in March alone as well. We grew more in February and March when compared to January. So what we produced in January, there was just one month when we increased our NII. And whatever was produced in March, this will be reflected in April. So our overnight loan portfolio, everything is under control in all lines. NPL, 100%.

speaker
André Carvalho
Investor Relations Officer, Bradesco

of provisions, and our coverage ratio varies flat and stable when compared to the previous quarter. Expanded ALL also brings important figures.

speaker
Marcelo Noronha
President & CEO, Bradesco

I'm not going to look at the previous quarter, but we had almost 18% growth year-on-year. I mean, in terms of mass retail, there was a drop. But the quality of what we are bringing is much better. We are much more effective in terms of our collection and credit recovery. Whenever we talk about A-double-L, I mean, this provision indicator versus the annualized portfolio, this is an index that we haven't seen for quite some time. The numbers are very important because it goes towards the NII that we presented in the previous quarter. Now, speaking about fees and commission income, this is very much leveraged on payments because of exchange and the companies that we have. So it's natural that it falls. I mean, this type of revenue is the lowest in terms of all the previous quarters, and the second quarter is better because we have Mother's Day, and the last quarter, you know, you have Children's Day, Black Friday, and all of the holidays, you know, the Christmas holidays. So 1.3% a year growth is an indication that growth will be according to our guidance. So it's within our expectations.

speaker
André Carvalho
Investor Relations Officer, Bradesco

And in all of the other lines, I would like to highlight consortia with this level of growth that you see. I mean, loan operations, 10%.

speaker
Marcelo Noronha
President & CEO, Bradesco

That means that we are well on track. And checking account. We have been losing ground with checking account, but now we resume growth because of some of the intelligent packages that we are using.

speaker
Renato Meloni
Analyst, Autonomy Research

delivering and capturing value.

speaker
Marcelo Noronha
President & CEO, Bradesco

I think the most difficult part is equities and capital markets and the expectation is low for this year and all of the reasons are well known to all of you. But we are very pleased to see the level of growth in terms of fee and commissions income. When it comes to Berdesco to run comparisons, I mean, other incumbents say that within the fee and commissions income, they also include insurance revenues. But in our case, that's separate because that is included in the insurance operations, our operating expenses. For me, that is a highlight. That's our goal. We talked about 4.4% year-on-year growth. We are delivering things with a lot of seriousness and the optimization of our footprint with about 300 movements in the first quarter of 2024. Now, when you look at the book, you will see a chart that shows branches and

speaker
André Carvalho
Investor Relations Officer, Bradesco

points of service.

speaker
Marcelo Noronha
President & CEO, Bradesco

Within that point of service, we have what we call PAs. We have small PAs and large PAs, which are points of service. This is another name used by the central bank, but it is a mini branch. In some municipalities, we shut down some of these PAs or points of service, but I will later on talk about the company segment. This is something that we referred to at the beginning of the year. We said that we would do another segmentation with very specific service with specific branches to cater to companies, and that's what we did. So here you see a larger number of branches serving companies.

speaker
André Carvalho
Investor Relations Officer, Bradesco

In fact, there was a reduction, significant reduction, or maybe at a bigger pace than what was previously announced. And later on I will talk about these new branches for companies and Bradesco Espresso.

speaker
Marcelo Noronha
President & CEO, Bradesco

When we talk about personnel and admin expenses, the growth was even below inflation in the period.

speaker
Ivan Gontijo
CEO, Bradesco Insurance Group

Here are the results of the insurance group that has shown an net income of 2 billion euros, 10% increase year-on-year, almost 20% ROAE, a substantial increase in premium income, pension plan contributions, and the results of almost a full billion showed a significant increase. And I'd like to highlight technical provisions, which grew almost 12%, reaching 380%. of quite a significant amount for the insurance group, which is doing quite well, performing really well. And here are bezel, Tier 1 bezel ratio of 12.7%.

speaker
André Carvalho
Investor Relations Officer, Bradesco

We have BAS in the book, so you can look at the total. And we provisioned IOC for Tier 1 of about 2.6 billion. And this brings me to the guidance. Here's what I can say.

speaker
Ivan Gontijo
CEO, Bradesco Insurance Group

When you look at this indicator in the previous quarter, what did we have? A declining, a negative number. With guard traction now, we are within the guidance.

speaker
André Carvalho
Investor Relations Officer, Bradesco

No doubt about that.

speaker
Ivan Gontijo
CEO, Bradesco Insurance Group

Of course, we have to move in this direction so that we will have a reflection in net interest income. So we have the loan book and then net interest income. And this can be the indicator that is the most challenging for all of us. But let's focus on 1.2% and then net interest income will improve and we'll believe we'll be within the guidance. The Commission income, to me, was delivered for the whole year based on the expectations that I mentioned.

speaker
André Carvalho
Investor Relations Officer, Bradesco

Operating expenses, very, very big. And, again, the expectation is that it will be in the guidance.

speaker
Ivan Gontijo
CEO, Bradesco Insurance Group

Income from insurance operations is a little lower, a little better, great. but we believe that it will be within the guidance. I'd like to remind you that the guidance is for the whole year, not for just one quarter. And AWL, as you can see, 7.8, 8 times 4, 32 billion. So you might think, will you be below the guidance? Are you being conservative? No. But the calculation is simple. If I'm going to grow here and mass-retain, mass-train these, I'll have more expensive losses, even with the better vintages. So, of course, I'm going to have more provisions down here.

speaker
André Carvalho
Investor Relations Officer, Bradesco

And that's why...

speaker
Ivan Gontijo
CEO, Bradesco Insurance Group

We believe that we'll be within the guidance one or other line item a little more towards the bottom of the guidance and some others more towards the higher end of the guidance. We continue to believe and we continue to move forward step by step as I mentioned in the previous quarters. I'll make some comments about running the bank and change the bank.

speaker
André Carvalho
Investor Relations Officer, Bradesco

In the past, we spoke about quick wins.

speaker
Ivan Gontijo
CEO, Bradesco Insurance Group

No, it's a plan. I said we are not going to be delivering the next quarter. We will be delivering that along the next few years and we'll have quick wins in recoveries, in collections, in some segments. So the reflection of all this over time will What do you see in our incomes? of some specific cases. For example, the delivery for the company segment, you can go to the branches and you can speak with people there. So we'll implement a new modeling and this will be reflected in our credit increase, credit quality, etc. So run and change are kind of mixed together because we do have quick wins.

speaker
André Carvalho
Investor Relations Officer, Bradesco

You remember the 10 times

speaker
Ivan Gontijo
CEO, Bradesco Insurance Group

Like I said in the beginning, I'm not going to go over them again, but I would like to make a brief comment, and you can look at these indicators. Let's think about the digital bank. 98% of transactions are carried out through digital channels.

speaker
André Carvalho
Investor Relations Officer, Bradesco

So I'm speaking about the app, mobile and internet banking, in the case of companies. And this is our timeline for our strategic plan.

speaker
Ivan Gontijo
CEO, Bradesco Insurance Group

You will remember that we presented a plan in detail. back in February.

speaker
André Carvalho
Investor Relations Officer, Bradesco

And what have we delivered so far?

speaker
Ivan Gontijo
CEO, Bradesco Insurance Group

A new organizational structure, a reduction of layers, and we are putting this into practice at the bank, and a span of control revision. So we increased that span of control. The transformation office today counts with more than 800 people, and this was only possible

speaker
André Carvalho
Investor Relations Officer, Bradesco

because of these reorg that we had, or else we would not have the ability to allocate leaders here.

speaker
Ivan Gontijo
CEO, Bradesco Insurance Group

So we are in a crisis of execution, which is very daring and bold and accelerated. You know that. We spoke about diagnosis, applying a structure, and execution.

speaker
Renato Meloni
Analyst, Autonomy Research

And execution, of course, is the biggest challenge for any organization.

speaker
Ivan Gontijo
CEO, Bradesco Insurance Group

But we are executing with determination, safety, and control. External hires. We also spoke about this. You will remember that we had two heads of departments that would report directly to me, one in HR and the other one for the business, the digital business unit, which will take mass market to digital. And I'd like to announce that we had a reinforcement of the credit BU with a whole reconfiguration and targeting we did and the creation of a portfolio management part. So we hired in the market a new credit director who has already joined us, Julio Guedes.

speaker
André Carvalho
Investor Relations Officer, Bradesco

He came from Serasa but has a track record in the banking industry.

speaker
Ivan Gontijo
CEO, Bradesco Insurance Group

His background is in statistics.

speaker
André Carvalho
Investor Relations Officer, Bradesco

He's worked with credit for a long time. He was an officer in his prior role, and he was already providing services to us.

speaker
Ivan Gontijo
CEO, Bradesco Insurance Group

I think it was great to bring Julio to the company to reinforce our credit team. And regarding the C-level, we already hired those two officers.

speaker
André Carvalho
Investor Relations Officer, Bradesco

This is a paradigm we broke.

speaker
Ivan Gontijo
CEO, Bradesco Insurance Group

Many people ask me, when will you be able to do it?

speaker
André Carvalho
Investor Relations Officer, Bradesco

Well, we The colleague who is coming for the digital unit as head of digital reporting directly to me is leading another company. And our agreement was that we will only disclose the person's name on May 9th. So on May 9th, we'll disclose the name and he will be starting to work on the 20th.

speaker
Ivan Gontijo
CEO, Bradesco Insurance Group

So we used the press for that in our department. And we also hired a woman, a colleague, who will be in the C-suite with us in HR. Silvana Machado.

speaker
André Carvalho
Investor Relations Officer, Bradesco

Silvana started today.

speaker
Ivan Gontijo
CEO, Bradesco Insurance Group

She's watching this call.

speaker
André Carvalho
Investor Relations Officer, Bradesco

And Silvana came from Advent. She was a talent manager with Advent. She was also in Egon Zender for many years.

speaker
Ivan Gontijo
CEO, Bradesco Insurance Group

And before that, Silvana worked for Eddie Craney and Buzz Allen, and always in financial services, in addition to having worked for many banks. So she is an asset for us. She copes with experience in dealing with culture and talent as well as her financial services knowledge so that she can be discussing any theme about the banking industry.

speaker
André Carvalho
Investor Relations Officer, Bradesco

And footprint revisions. I mentioned about this, about 300 points. And this continues here.

speaker
Ivan Gontijo
CEO, Bradesco Insurance Group

This will stretch until year-end. with strong execution. And the opening of 122 branches dedicated to companies. I'd like to congratulate the team that worked strongly on this to put together the team.

speaker
André Carvalho
Investor Relations Officer, Bradesco

And here I show you a picture of these branches dedicated to companies.

speaker
Ivan Gontijo
CEO, Bradesco Insurance Group

We segmented 143,000 clients in this target of 3 to 15 million URLs with 2,000 professionals focused on customer service.

speaker
André Carvalho
Investor Relations Officer, Bradesco

with a specific vertical. This is outside the network.

speaker
Ivan Gontijo
CEO, Bradesco Insurance Group

We are working on this to have a service model, which is exclusive to companies with specialists. In addition to the experience here, we'll manage risk. This is the name of the game here. We are closer. Just like we did with middle market, we are now doing with these SMEs. without losing sight of everything we're doing, but ethnicities between 80,000 and 3 million URLs per year using remote service via the app. But we increased the team that serves these legal entities, these enterprises.

speaker
André Carvalho
Investor Relations Officer, Bradesco

And our expectation is that by the end of the year, we'll have about 250,000 clients already targeted and allocated here. And after that expanding our radius of action for SMEs and ensure that we are going to have a lot of traction here. Looking forward, what are our expected deliveries until 2028? We'll be looking at this timeline.

speaker
Ivan Gontijo
CEO, Bradesco Insurance Group

When your effluent segment will continue to hire for technology and digital channels, we'll have the same transportation as I mentioned and we'll expand for Disco Express. And here I'd like to comment on another delivery. You know that this is a differential about the distribution Prodisco has about 38,000 merchants using our Prodisco Express.

speaker
André Carvalho
Investor Relations Officer, Bradesco

We can use this to sell banking products and services and also to have transactions with customers. So we delivered a new platform, as you can see here in this photograph.

speaker
Ivan Gontijo
CEO, Bradesco Insurance Group

In Q1, we already rolled out just about 1,000 merchants. And these were having a totally different experience. I mentioned in the prior quarter that this is something that we're developing and preparing. So the moment the merchants identify with their taxpayer number, automatically our CRM engine uses intelligence. And even if they are not in a checking account holder, the system identifies what we can sell to these clients, what we can offer them according to their profile and risk. So our level of efficiency tends to grow significantly here. You know, the Disco Expressor has 100% of presence in Brazilian municipalities. And this quarter, look at the insurance sales versus Q123, up 89% on this channel. And origination of payroll deductible loans, 361% increase. So we expect to give a lot more traction to this person.

speaker
André Carvalho
Investor Relations Officer, Bradesco

And there's another duty to you.

speaker
Ivan Gontijo
CEO, Bradesco Insurance Group

We have four providers of these solutions. Go to the merchants with the traditional POS machines and some functionalities and features in these machines. We are unifying all that. Two have left, and by the end of the year, we'll have just one platform with a lot more versatility and the ability to deliver functionalities and features to operate with these merchants.

speaker
André Carvalho
Investor Relations Officer, Bradesco

So this is basically it. I'm going to move to my conclusions.

speaker
Renato Meloni
Analyst, Autonomy Research

I spoke a lot about run the bank and change the bank.

speaker
Ivan Gontijo
CEO, Bradesco Insurance Group

So I'd like to just reinforce improvement of AWL in retail and wholesale.

speaker
André Carvalho
Investor Relations Officer, Bradesco

Expenses control and robust credit growth in all segments in addition to the results of this insurance. And then change the bank. I highlight our external hires.

speaker
Ivan Gontijo
CEO, Bradesco Insurance Group

I've just mentioned one of the names.

speaker
André Carvalho
Investor Relations Officer, Bradesco

This was the first delivery.

speaker
Ivan Gontijo
CEO, Bradesco Insurance Group

And then the reinforcement of the credit view with revision of processes.

speaker
Renato Meloni
Analyst, Autonomy Research

In the opening of the rentals for companies for SMEs, this has been delivered.

speaker
Ivan Gontijo
CEO, Bradesco Insurance Group

Footprint revision, that's strongly in the way. And expansion for this. As I've just mentioned, we have deliveries. We are following the plans step by step so that we'll offer better and better earnings every quarter. Thank you for your attention. And I now have my colleagues, Cassiano Strapelli, our CFO, and André Carvalho, our new IR officer, taking over from Peretti.

speaker
André Carvalho
Investor Relations Officer, Bradesco

And we'll start the Q&A.

speaker
Ivan Gontijo
CEO, Bradesco Insurance Group

André, over to you.

speaker
Marcelo Noronha
President & CEO, Bradesco

I think I already said a lot. Good morning, everyone. I would like to inform all participants that Ivan Gontijo, the CEO of our insurance company, is also joining us during this Q&A session, and he's with us remotely. But if you want to send in your questions, you can send them either in Portuguese or English, and please do so using our email, investors, like you see in the screen, investors at bradesco.com.br, or Or using the WhatsApp number, the information appears on the screen. The first question comes from Renato Meloni from Autonomous. Renato, over to you. We can't hear you. I think you're muted.

speaker
Renato Meloni
Analyst, Autonomy Research

Good morning. Thank you for taking my question.

speaker
Marcelo Noronha
President & CEO, Bradesco

I have two questions. The first question is about your transformation plan. Now that three months have gone by since the official launch of the program and you have more visibility, What is different when compared to the original plan? And given your current visibility, whether there has been any changes in terms of delivering ROE above the cost of capital, and you said that you would do that throughout 2026. My second question relates to the guidance. to reach the NII guidance. This means that you have to have better origination, better margin, because I think this will come with the mix, and this will improve provisioning. So how do you see these three levers performing throughout the year, and what is the pace, and where do you see the risk of not delivering what you expect, not delivering to plan?

speaker
André Carvalho
Investor Relations Officer, Bradesco

Well, thank you for your questions.

speaker
Marcelo Noronha
President & CEO, Bradesco

I will ask Cassiano to start, and then I will Not only Cassiano is the CFO, but he's the CPO. So Cassiano is the best person to talk about the KPIs of our transformation plan. Thank you. Thank you, Renato. Thank you for your question.

speaker
Cassiano Strapelli
CFO & Chief Planning Officer, Bradesco

Our transformation plan...

speaker
Marcelo Noronha
President & CEO, Bradesco

I mean, what we did, we ratified what we envisioned in the diagnosis of our transformation process. As Marcelo put it quite well, we have over 800 people engaged, 2,600 initiatives, and the KPIs are very apparent. I mean, starting with the footprint all the way to the rent, the bank, and credit segments. Also, that involves recovery, risk. hiring new people, technology, etc. So we launched the plan on February 19th. That's when our new office started operating. But looking back today, we can say that this whole mapping was very important. And we found more things, which was quite interesting. We found other things that can lead us to us having a more agile bank, a more digital bank, even more than what we are, rendering Even a better customer experience is not way ahead in the future, but it's throughout the journey. And I am certain that the plan is well structured and the deliveries are well in schedule, and we will improve performance. Renato, just to add to what he said,

speaker
André Carvalho
Investor Relations Officer, Bradesco

In fact, we reinstate that number.

speaker
Marcelo Noronha
President & CEO, Bradesco

You might recall that I talked about the total number. You may have some small adjustments to the calendar. Okay, this was expected for December, but it may be earlier or later. I thought that SME would help us. performed better further on, but we were able to deliver the numbers before schedule. So we still have that expectation in terms of the numbers. You might recall that if our CAGR for loan book would materialize, if CAGR would be 1% a year growth, Our loan portfolio total growth for the expender portfolio will be 3.3 trillion in five years.

speaker
André Carvalho
Investor Relations Officer, Bradesco

I mean, we want to capture part of it.

speaker
Marcelo Noronha
President & CEO, Bradesco

And the expectation remains firm. And we see through traction that we do have the capacity to get there. Secondly, in regards to that ROE expectation that you mentioned, I would just say it again.

speaker
André Carvalho
Investor Relations Officer, Bradesco

I don't want to just...

speaker
Marcelo Noronha
President & CEO, Bradesco

You know, just promise things. I want to deliver. As soon as I can deliver, we will deliver to expectations. And that's what we intend to do, to deliver things as time goes by. And the other question was about client NII. How do we expedite that? I mean, we accelerate through growing our loan portfolio. And during my presentation, I said that, okay, we gained market share in February. In January, we did not gain share. So we had to move faster in February, which we did. So I firmly believe that we will gain share in March. In April, that's when we will see what has been done. that NII, things will not happen overnight. First, we will see a growth in the portfolio, and then we will see an increase in our net margin because the bottom line is that the liquidity is under control. We are bringing good quality things to our portfolio, and that's when we will see a growth in NII. and effective growth in NII. So you might recall that I'm talking about two different types of portfolios and two different types of risk assessments. This would require additional effort on the part of the bank. I don't know whether you would like to mention it. I mean, the client NII will be better in the second quarter vis-a-vis the first quarter because there is a gradual evolution. First quarter, lower ALL. And then with time, you know, the margin will grow with ALL because we will go through, you know, more risky sectors. And our funding cost is coming down as well. This is what we are noticing. And this has an impact in the timeline. Renato, thank you for your questions. The next question comes from Brian Flores from Citi.

speaker
Ivan Gontijo
CEO, Bradesco Insurance Group

Go ahead. Hello, thank you for taking my question.

speaker
Renato Meloni
Analyst, Autonomy Research

With a more restrictive central bank, and you talked about funding, how does that change funding?

speaker
Marcelo Noronha
President & CEO, Bradesco

And also talking about market and I.I., what is your view about market and I.I.?

speaker
Cassiano Strapelli
CFO & Chief Planning Officer, Bradesco

? Hi, it's a pleasure to see you.

speaker
Marcelo Noronha
President & CEO, Bradesco

In terms of market and AI, I would say that we don't see any major changes through this year. There was a slight drop, you know, from one quarter to the next, and the central bank with a more restricted curve, but that two-tip curve, as we say, it is very important for our pre-fixed portfolio because it brings a more interesting fee volume, and we believe that even though the landscape is more restrictive, it points to a decline in interest rates because 9.5% or 10%, that is not very significant because it doesn't change the landscape as much in terms of our treasury position. Therefore, we see this as something beneficial because on the one hand, we reinstate our loan portfolio with

speaker
Cassiano Strapelli
CFO & Chief Planning Officer, Bradesco

higher rates. So in terms of the cycle as a whole, the cycle would indicate into 9.5% to 10%.

speaker
Marcelo Noronha
President & CEO, Bradesco

Our economist points to 9.25%. I don't believe in a cycle where interest rates will spike after that. So this scenario will bring about good results, and the market is performing well pretty much along the lines that we mentioned before, which is positive, and we see a positive trend towards 2025. Just to reinstate what he said, the expectation is that the market is very bullish from now on, and the fact that the rate will come down 50 or 25 basis points, nothing much will change, okay?

speaker
André Carvalho
Investor Relations Officer, Bradesco

Thank you for your questions.

speaker
Ivan Gontijo
CEO, Bradesco Insurance Group

Jorge Cury with Morgan Stanley. Mr. Cury.

speaker
André Carvalho
Investor Relations Officer, Bradesco

Mr. Cury. Hi, good morning.

speaker
Ivan Gontijo
CEO, Bradesco Insurance Group

Can you hear me now?

speaker
André Carvalho
Investor Relations Officer, Bradesco

Yes, yes, we can. Thank you.

speaker
Renato Meloni
Analyst, Autonomy Research

I think that the positive highlight of the quarter was the improved credit quality.

speaker
Ivan Gontijo
CEO, Bradesco Insurance Group

It seems you're very confident to accelerate growth in those loans with higher spread. The question is, is the bank ready to accelerate maintaining NPL under control, particularly with in retail? What were the main adjustments the bank made in terms of policies, credit filters?

speaker
Renato Meloni
Analyst, Autonomy Research

What were the main structural adjustments?

speaker
Ivan Gontijo
CEO, Bradesco Insurance Group

If you can elaborate that perhaps from the qualitative standpoint, that would be very helpful.

speaker
André Carvalho
Investor Relations Officer, Bradesco

Thank you. Thank you for the question. As I mentioned during the presentation,

speaker
Ivan Gontijo
CEO, Bradesco Insurance Group

We have been using a lot more machine learning than in the past, exactly to improve our modeling.

speaker
André Carvalho
Investor Relations Officer, Bradesco

So from the qualitative standpoint, if Andre Edwards were sitting here, he would tell you exactly that. So that's number one. Number two, we worked on our credit policies for certain credit ratings. that are higher risk, we now have a policy in place which is a lot more reserved than in the past.

speaker
Ivan Gontijo
CEO, Bradesco Insurance Group

It's when you talk about the proportion of income, proportion of company or ethnic revenues, what kind of proportion of that you want to have in legal entities.

speaker
André Carvalho
Investor Relations Officer, Bradesco

So what kind of quota do you want to have and the kind of loan.

speaker
Ivan Gontijo
CEO, Bradesco Insurance Group

We proved our policy a lot and it will improve even more when Julio Guedes joins us.

speaker
André Carvalho
Investor Relations Officer, Bradesco

His mission is to manage the portfolio with pricing. With pricing, we have pricing for products and now pricing is in the credit department. And that will improve our value proposition and

speaker
Ivan Gontijo
CEO, Bradesco Insurance Group

That was an important structural change so that we could adequately price our loans and adjust the levels of approval.

speaker
André Carvalho
Investor Relations Officer, Bradesco

But in mass market, I'd say that this is it. New credit policies, new credit models with a collection process which is very fine-tuned and

speaker
Ivan Gontijo
CEO, Bradesco Insurance Group

a living portfolio management which is what we do now that gives us greater safety regarding everything we define the indicators that we are measuring strictly we are measuring them full time and also in the wholesale bank we made some changes we hired other people you know It was not just one officer. We brought in teams for the credit department. We're still hiring people. And we changed some processes so that we could have a lot more agility in serving legal entities. I'm talking about all the way from large corporates down to middle income and those in the East. So with that, we have a much more productive organization than we had recently. And our managers feel that.

speaker
André Carvalho
Investor Relations Officer, Bradesco

If you speak with our regional managers throughout Brazil for coverage, they'll confirm what I'm saying. This whole modeling and these controls that are now in place, please remember that in the business unit, with this portfolio management department, we have the first and second line of defense.

speaker
Ivan Gontijo
CEO, Bradesco Insurance Group

We have colleagues in charge of modeling, and then colleagues who check the modeling and validate the modeling, regardless of the risk control department. So what I can tell you is we're very safe.

speaker
André Carvalho
Investor Relations Officer, Bradesco

I mean, of course. We are not going to be with that ratio for the vintages, but a little higher, which is the optimal point.

speaker
Ivan Gontijo
CEO, Bradesco Insurance Group

But what we imagine is the economic return of each cluster of clients so that we can work with the bottom line without a good pricing. If it doesn't match what we're expecting, we just won't do it. We're not safe about what we're doing. We're delivering qualitatively. There's AI behind this, but AI is not the main tool. The main tool is machine learning.

speaker
Cassiano Strapelli
CFO & Chief Planning Officer, Bradesco

Yes, I think that what you mentioned, Richard, is very important. The concept of principality, having the clients with us, there's a lot of traction.

speaker
Ivan Gontijo
CEO, Bradesco Insurance Group

We can see that in those curves of the vintages. And this is our DNA. We know how to do this.

speaker
Cassiano Strapelli
CFO & Chief Planning Officer, Bradesco

We were able to reinvent ourselves with everything you said. And we have new colleagues in re-skilling for the people in the credit department.

speaker
Ivan Gontijo
CEO, Bradesco Insurance Group

So these are all fundamental pieces in the game.

speaker
André Carvalho
Investor Relations Officer, Bradesco

These were positive, significant positive changes. These were adjustments made. Is it credit cards for non-check-in card holders?

speaker
Ivan Gontijo
CEO, Bradesco Insurance Group

That's the modality where we are more restricted. For high-income clients, we are growing credit cards almost 12%. So the OPC in cards offers a little more risk today. But we have modeling for that. So we have some peace of mind regarding what we are doing in each one of the segments. We are not working with just one segment. This is about mass market, high income and companies of all sizes including the wholesale week.

speaker
André Carvalho
Investor Relations Officer, Bradesco

Thank you. Thank you.

speaker
Ivan Gontijo
CEO, Bradesco Insurance Group

So we are now going to Daniel Vaz with Cefra.

speaker
André Carvalho
Investor Relations Officer, Bradesco

Good morning, everyone. I'd like to ask a question about SMEs. You showed a chart of originating for mass, the company's mass market.

speaker
Ivan Gontijo
CEO, Bradesco Insurance Group

You're still away from the average of 2019. How do you explain this gap? We have a plus 90 day in Belgrade, but why is origination not at the same level of 2019? Is it a supply or demand issue? When can we expect this to grow?

speaker
André Carvalho
Investor Relations Officer, Bradesco

Number one, it's about risk appetite.

speaker
Ivan Gontijo
CEO, Bradesco Insurance Group

This is the highest risk segment. Particularly for those companies 0 to 3.

speaker
André Carvalho
Investor Relations Officer, Bradesco

But in 3 to 50, I spoke about management living portfolio. So there's a management model that is being implemented in this segment. And that allows us to follow up on the living portfolio and act on it totally differently.

speaker
Ivan Gontijo
CEO, Bradesco Insurance Group

It is automated, but at the same time it counts on our colleagues, the managers, the regional managers to act on it.

speaker
Renato Meloni
Analyst, Autonomy Research

on specific cases.

speaker
Ivan Gontijo
CEO, Bradesco Insurance Group

So we'll improve the quality to 3 to 50 million girls, but until 3 million, there is effectively more risk because the Brazilian market is like that for us.

speaker
André Carvalho
Investor Relations Officer, Bradesco

So we have a little appetite to get there. But we believe that we have succeeded and we will continue to grow originally. And another reason to believe in that is that we totally changed our offering, what we offered to our sales force.

speaker
Ivan Gontijo
CEO, Bradesco Insurance Group

Hope we approved the way to approach clients with a commercial tool. It's all changed. And it started now in the month of April.

speaker
Renato Meloni
Analyst, Autonomy Research

with a different setup, different configuration.

speaker
Ivan Gontijo
CEO, Bradesco Insurance Group

In our opinion, in the opinion of the colleagues responsible for that segment, this will give a lot more traction. So have a better credit quality, better credit analysis, more specialists working in that segment, a new commercial tool. I mean, it's not a new tool. It's a new commercial format for this segment. And this new segment of 3 to 50 million that we've verticalized

speaker
André Carvalho
Investor Relations Officer, Bradesco

just a different traction compared to the segment of up to 3 million per hour a year.

speaker
Ivan Gontijo
CEO, Bradesco Insurance Group

So we believe we will increase loan origination, but with the right controls and quality.

speaker
Renato Meloni
Analyst, Autonomy Research

And to add, when we look at the track record of Delhi,

speaker
Ivan Gontijo
CEO, Bradesco Insurance Group

The historical series shows that individuals drop first and then S&Es and then small enterprises. So small enterprises are having their inflection now. That's the market risk that Marcelo talks about. That's why our appetite will move step by step with safety. In the future, we should accelerate in the segment of smaller companies that will require more provisions, but the margin will more than us. And the credit policy that we just did, we will commit all the time.

speaker
André Carvalho
Investor Relations Officer, Bradesco

Daniel, thank you very much for the question.

speaker
Ivan Gontijo
CEO, Bradesco Insurance Group

Now, Mário Pieri with Bank of America.

speaker
Cassiano Strapelli
CFO & Chief Planning Officer, Bradesco

Good morning.

speaker
Marcelo Noronha
President & CEO, Bradesco

I have two questions. First question, when we look at the bank's coverage ratio, we calculate the ratio close to 162%. I mean, it's lower than your peers. But we also look at your complementary provision close to $6.2 billion, and historically it used to be around $8 to $9 billion. Do you intend to revisit those reserves? How do you feel the reserve level stands today? And the second question is about capital. There was a decline in your CTO ratio, a drop. Quarter on quarter. So how do you see this CET ratio impacting your dividend policy or even your capacity to grow? In terms of coverage ratio, We do not have a target for that coverage ratio because it fluctuates according to the credit cycle. So if the cycle aggravates, you know, delinquency as well. I mean, because we increase the amount of provisions. I mean, we provision for 100% of our clients. As the credit cycle begins to change, when we saw that happening the first quarter of the year, Certainly, the coverage ratio increases because we originate credit that naturally at the beginning comes with higher provisions than delinquency coverage increases. Therefore, this is a very cyclical KPI. We are not very much concerned with it. We think it's very adequate for the current moment, and certainly it has a natural recovery.

speaker
Cassiano Strapelli
CFO & Chief Planning Officer, Bradesco

Now, in terms of CT1, I mean, we continue to say that capital is well in place and in terms of the capacity to do all the traction that Marcelo talked about. We can say that it grew vis-a-vis the third quarter of 23.

speaker
Marcelo Noronha
President & CEO, Bradesco

There was a slight drop in this first quarter, basically focused on, you know, mark-to-market bonds, but this also has to do with IOC, and so we understand that it develops naturally. We don't anticipate any changes in this capital throughout the year. It will be very close to what you see today.

speaker
Cassiano Strapelli
CFO & Chief Planning Officer, Bradesco

And we believe that this could be a possible leverage to our credit increase. Therefore, our capital is in a very comfortable position right now.

speaker
Marcelo Noronha
President & CEO, Bradesco

Well, first of all, you know that we project.

speaker
André Carvalho
Investor Relations Officer, Bradesco

capital going forward.

speaker
Marcelo Noronha
President & CEO, Bradesco

Also, we projected for following years, we see capital standing flat, even though the portfolio is growing. No problems here. Secondly, I don't think this will be a limiting factor for growth or even the distribution of interest on capital. And the coverage ratio, I think I told you In the first quarter, I referred to how comfortable we are in terms of the wholesale banking. Our total coverage ratio is very good, and particularly in terms of the wholesale bank, because I was asked this question by journalists during our press conference. It is very much under control, and I talked about that last quarter. Our coverage ratio is ideal, and we even have some room for other cases related to expected losses. Therefore, no problem at all in terms of our coverage ratio. Thank you for the questions. Mario, now we have Tiago Batista from UBS.

speaker
Renato Meloni
Analyst, Autonomy Research

Next question. Good morning. Thank you for taking my questions. I have two questions.

speaker
Marcelo Noronha
President & CEO, Bradesco

One is, I mean, it's a follow-up question. My first question is about the insurance business. We could see an increase in technical provisions. Quite significant this quarter. But when you look at the details, you had $2.4 billion. in additional coverage provision.

speaker
Renato Meloni
Analyst, Autonomy Research

There are other technical reasons.

speaker
Marcelo Noronha
President & CEO, Bradesco

Last quarter, you used part of that technical provision. I would just like to understand two things. If this was part of your income statement or if there was something that was recurring and you wanted to reset, so what was the reason for that additional coverage? And now speaking about Mario's question on capital. I understand that you said that maybe at the end of the year, your capital position will be similar to the one we have today. Does that include any kind of arrangement in terms of the capital for the insurance company? Or I think in 2015 or 2016, you would get capital together with IOT. Is there anything included in this line? Or maybe historically you think that you could keep capital very stable? The portfolio, I think, increased by 1.4, and you consume 1.3 billion in capital, so it doesn't seem ideal to keep it stable and maintain the guidance without any sort of arrangement in terms of the insurance company or IOC. I mean, to answer your second question, I will say no. I mean, you're saying that you have an additional flexibility. We won't even need to use that because we could even think about using it, but I don't think we will need to. Our production leads us to say that with a great degree of certainty, it would change from last quarter to this quarter. The main motivation...

speaker
Cassiano Strapelli
CFO & Chief Planning Officer, Bradesco

involved two things.

speaker
Marcelo Noronha
President & CEO, Bradesco

Payroll. We had the payment of two important payrolls.

speaker
Cassiano Strapelli
CFO & Chief Planning Officer, Bradesco

And also, you know, NTNP, which is mark-to-market bonds.

speaker
Marcelo Noronha
President & CEO, Bradesco

And this is due to the natural hedge of our funding. And also, this is related to private pension funds, which is an important part of this project. So these were two Big movement. And one-off event. And the difference is due to the payroll payment.

speaker
Renato Meloni
Analyst, Autonomy Research

I mean, to the payment of payrolls.

speaker
Marcelo Noronha
President & CEO, Bradesco

That's why our projections and our growth curve is very much under control. I think we can also... ask Ivan to answer the second question. But I would like to recall another point about the insurance company. This is something that we already saw in the past.

speaker
Cassiano Strapelli
CFO & Chief Planning Officer, Bradesco

Thiago said that himself, this is part of the technical strategy.

speaker
Marcelo Noronha
President & CEO, Bradesco

At some moments, we had to do some improvements in the provisions. This was strictly technical and the provision has to do with all of the economics of the insurance business.

speaker
Cassiano Strapelli
CFO & Chief Planning Officer, Bradesco

I now would like to ask Ivan to add to my comments.

speaker
Marcelo Noronha
President & CEO, Bradesco

Ivan, I think you may recall the question.

speaker
André Carvalho
Investor Relations Officer, Bradesco

He talked about technical provisions and whether that...

speaker
Marcelo Noronha
President & CEO, Bradesco

had any impact on our income statement and what would be the additional provision. So, Ivan, go ahead. Thank you, Marcelo and Cassiano. I think Cassiano already explained the technique of you. I would just say that... That increase in provisions is linked to an increase in the revenue of insurance and pension funds, special pension funds and savings bonds. So that link in that increase in provisions is proportional to increase in revenues. Secondly, this is also due to the so-called product mix that we have. We have insurance products, pension fund products, and certainly they demand an adequate level of provisions, always having a very conservative approach. And, Marcelo, you mentioned our... our provisioning, which is close to 380 million reais, especially products like pension funds that increase significantly during the period. I would just like to emphasize that there hasn't been any kind of recurring gain that could probably lead us to have anything different in our structures. So everything is business as usual. and in compliance with the regulating agencies because it's important that we comply with our short, mid, and long-term agreements.

speaker
André Carvalho
Investor Relations Officer, Bradesco

Okay, thank you very much.

speaker
Ivan Gontijo
CEO, Bradesco Insurance Group

Next question from Tito Labarta with Goldman Sachs. Go ahead, sir.

speaker
Tito Labarta
Analyst, Goldman Sachs

Thank you for the call and taking those questions. My question is on your funding. We're looking at the project-based finance order, and I know that we've been seeing an outage related to that. I've also seen a big shift in demand deposits and time deposits. Now that could be a function of rates. But just putting that in the context of the competitive environment that we're seeing, are you having to pay more? to retain deposits and retain finance and if that limits your ability to control your NII because in order to fund the growth you will need to pay more for deposits. I'm thinking about that. Thank you.

speaker
André Carvalho
Investor Relations Officer, Bradesco

Thank you.

speaker
Cassiano Strapelli
CFO & Chief Planning Officer, Bradesco

Thank you, Tito, for the question. The world funding card continues and has helped to live on liquidity ratio. It's quite robust. And so it's been reducing a little.

speaker
Ivan Gontijo
CEO, Bradesco Insurance Group

Because we have to balance with our credit granting. We have to optimize cash and cost. So funding cost somehow continues to grow. It has a little bit to do with the reduction in LCR. and credit consumption demand deposits continue to suffer because as clients pay attention or their approach by our investment department or our platform, they tend to look for products with more profitability. Our funds grew almost 20 billion euros and some of that comes from the movement of demand deposits and savings accounts. Savings accounts have been dropping. In the system as a whole there is always this discussion about savings. accounts and CDI. And this comes from the discussion with the fintechs. So clients look at differentiated opportunities. We have Agora, our experts, onboarding the channels, the app or internet banking. And they, one way or another, observe this and provide opportunities to clients. So we see this as a natural moment in the industry. But we have products with different allocations to different clients. So with savings accounts and demand deposits, they are enough to maintain our strategy for rural loans or mortgages, real estate, finance. Would you like to add anything? But you know, in savings accounts, we had a market share of 13%, and that increased to 13.1%. This is kind of the DNA of our clients. We have a savings account DNA, so savings accounts tend to remain flat, but the non-floating products with higher interest rates have a trend to capture more clients. So we see this movement with us. has been natural and a lot of people have asked us about funding linked to changes in those what we call exempt securities and the impact here is practically zero. First because we have funding with exempt securities that is being accelerated to purchase inventory and then we have a natural replacement of these exempt securities by other bonds. So the impact here is practically zero in our funding. Next question from Edward Rosman with BTG.

speaker
Cassiano Strapelli
CFO & Chief Planning Officer, Bradesco

And thank you, Tito. Good morning. I have a question about...

speaker
Ivan Gontijo
CEO, Bradesco Insurance Group

the results in the different segments of the bank. Because the earnings of the bank improved, the insurance company remains, well, it lost a little bit of relevance as a whole in this quarter. And you don't really disclose the results for high income, low income, retail, and wholesale. So it would be interesting to hear from you where do you see easier improvements in the results, if in low income, if the reduced provision is already improving the result, and whether there is any segment that is efficient, if you could elaborate about the different segments of the bank.

speaker
André Carvalho
Investor Relations Officer, Bradesco

Thank you. Thank you, Rosalind, for the question. Well, we are doing more in the wholesale bank.

speaker
Ivan Gontijo
CEO, Bradesco Insurance Group

We have an RAR that is high for the different segments, and this is also for high-income segments, not to mention private. So that's doing quite well. Our challenge, as you know, spoke about the insurance group, but our challenge, as you know, comes from our mass market clients, given the cost to serve and delinquency, and we've been paying that bill. but indeed things are starting to improve a lot. In SMEs in particular, though we see the delinquency curve dropping, but there's some improvement. Month by month we see improvement. So our expectation is that We will drive the RAR of the mass market quarter after quarter. And I have to tell you, we don't really disclose this breakdown, but what I can tell you is that all business units have a lot of traction right now. An area that might have a small traction or a smaller traction could be small and mid-sized enterprises. But it's improving. And again, that open sea of a lower income client because they have a higher risk. But they are all with a lot of traction. Not by chance that we are doing this. We are growing credit general segments in important lines. So we have the ability to deliver and to deliver more than we are delivering right now. And what I see and what I am living, because I've been going all over Brazil, I've been having breakfast with colleagues in the headquarters, in many locations, in Rio de Janeiro, in Sao Paulo, in Salvador. And I see everyone motivated and excited and moving in the same direction. So we are improving the risk-adjusted return for all of these segments. We are going to be delivering. in the future quarters. That's my expectation for all business units. And in the mass market, perhaps the biggest challenge is to accelerate credit, maintaining NPL, declining and adjusting the footprint. And the numbers we showed here point exactly at that. The new vintage of mass market increasing, accelerating with exceptional quality and the footprint adjustment happening. Thank you, Rosman, for the question. Next question from Eduardo Nishi with Genial.

speaker
Marcelo Noronha
President & CEO, Bradesco

Good morning, everyone. Thank you for taking my question. Yeah, everything is fine. Thank you. My question relates to your strategic plan. Part of the recovery that you anticipate comes from improvement in the cycle that impacted the mass market, but most of it comes from more structural changes that you are promoting. I would like you to elaborate further on your structural changes and everything else that is happening with your strategic planning. If you could list probably the main strategic structural changes that you have in mind for the next quarters or maybe years, and also if you could give me more details about changes in management and cultural changes as well that you were trying to introduce in the bank, especially that cultural aspect, because this has been something so important in the DNA of the bank. How do you anticipate in terms of these changes, and what do you see going forward in 2028 after everything has been done? Well, thank you. These are very open questions, and I think we could spend days here just answering everything in more details. I'll ask Cassie to help me with the answers. Well, number one, that delivery of the credit business unit. We unified processes that were separated in our organization, so everything is now combined, integrated. I mean, the separation of the teams that used to serve the mass market and the wholesale bank. We made also important process changes, first line of defense, second line of defense, with the use of machine learning. running in the background of our modeling. And we also introduced some credit policies because you put a certain appetite. Okay, you say, I want to give 50% of the company's revenue. So that was one change. The second change was segmentation. That segment of SME is one of the things that we told you that we would launch early this year. It's already in place. We don't have all the clients already in there because we're still in the process of segmenting clients. But we will also deliver the affluent segment, the wealth segment in the second half. But we are also working on restructuring our prime segment for wealthier clients, and that's another important segmentation. In terms of the wholesale banking, I told you that we made some process changes. on the loan book side. So I'm saying that this is something that is already happening, and this is generating results. And in turn, this will improve our numbers with time. And obviously, I think the biggest challenge is in the cost to serve or more mass retail clients. Well, we are reviewing the footprint because we are delivering products above plan, but we will deliver numbers above the plan with costs under control. And all of these deliveries will allow us to get that additional revenue that we talked about last year. But even today, I said that since the market is growing with a CAGR of 8% a year in terms of the credit volume for the next five years, it will bring an additional $3.3 billion BRLs to the Brazilian market in five years. And certainly we want to capture part of that so that when we go forward, our revenue level will be much higher and the return will be higher because, you know, the bottom line matters, which is the profitability that we will have. And, Cassiano, I think you can add to what I'm saying, because out of the 10 topics that we listed, we had over 2,600 initiatives. But I am just highlighting some of the main initiatives. And also, there was that movement of time to market that we're doing with the technology area and the very intensive use of

speaker
Renato Meloni
Analyst, Autonomy Research

of Gen AI.

speaker
Marcelo Noronha
President & CEO, Bradesco

I would also mention these two. Yeah, I'll talk about that management side as well. But there are two important points. Bradesco Espresso, it's a very important link with this new concept of the new footprint and our cost to serve. together with digital Marcelo also mentioned that during the presentation it's a very strong digital bank for this school espresso is a very positive tool because we can be present in many municipalities technology Marcelo mentioned that not only in terms of risk killing but also we are hiring New people, we're hiring people at all levels of technology and all important processes are becoming more agile. It's becoming more productive. It's a new concept. And this is across the board. and culture management. I think you should also talk a little bit about that and what we are doing in terms of our culture. Regardless of the fact that we do not want to lose our Bradesco way of being, we also want to have new colleagues that can add important values. Here, we have colleagues from three different places. I even think that when we meet in person, I think we can also discuss things with the sales side. I would say that what we are seeing, just trying to make an executive summary of everything, we are bringing two C-levels to the organization, people that are being brought from the market, and this is an important cultural change. The reduction of these layers brought about an enormous difference in terms of speed. As I was saying before, I've been going around the country and having breakfast and lunches with different people. I'm meeting with different segments of the industry. And it is... Amazing to see that once you shorten the layers, the communication becomes much faster. Things become a lot more agile. And our decision-making process, you know, in the bank, if you just start interviewing people from within, people will come and talk to you about it. That's another relevant aspect once we talk about changes to our culture and management. Silvana is just arriving. She will work together with Juliano in that transition. She will work with me as well. So we are working on that new HR plan that I've been telling you that we will deliver. And we will go even beyond. We eliminated some positions, some layers. And we want to continue to do changes within our organization with hierarchical levels, maybe. better so that throughout the end of this year and next year we will have a lean year, you know, a more lean company. We do not want to eliminate the values because the values are important because they support our culture, but that's not all. In fact, we want to maintain values. What values?

speaker
Ivan Gontijo
CEO, Bradesco Insurance Group

For example, we will stop offering promotions and career promotions. No, ultimately, this is a place where you can get promoted and improve professionally. But we are also willing to bring somebody from the market. If we need to have more skills in the organization, this is basically it. Our employees, our managers, they carry the banner of Frutisco. Why is it that we would think We want to harness this even more, but we want to have a wider management in our organization with fewer layers. We want to have a different outlook, a different perspective, see the areas that are different differently, not being standardized, with a much faster decision-making, with a lot of technology integration, different skills directed to digital. And this is what you're going to see in our organization. with these changes in cultural trends, with these additions that we'll have, that we will, not really, that we have been, the changes that we have been making in the organization. And with a span of control that is different, you have no idea, Nishio, it's so different. So I think this is it, because we even spoke about this in the prior quarter, about the total volume of revenue available I'm almost sure of that. I haven't got the number from the top of my head, but please check the previous earnings contest call. And I want to take this moment to draw your attention. If you look at my presentation back then and my presentation today, please let me know if there is any difference. What we said back then is what we're executing.

speaker
André Carvalho
Investor Relations Officer, Bradesco

And another important thing.

speaker
Ivan Gontijo
CEO, Bradesco Insurance Group

There is nothing else in this bank that is not measured. Everything in run the bank or change the bank is measured. We have a new project. For example, we are going to expand our middle corporate segment. It will be expanded. This project has been approved. We'll grow the team. Another 10 platforms around Brazil. What we call platform is actually having a branch. dedicated to this middle corporate segment. But it all involves measurements. And decisions are made quickly. But all suggestions need to be proven. And it's going to be a cheap branch, not a huge branch. It's a platform, as we call it, when you look at total numbers, but it's registered as a branch at the Central Bank of Brazil. So initially, I think that this is kind of an overview. And one last comment. The result of the transformation process will be recorded in the operating results of the bank, and that's fundamental. So we have to focus on the operating results to see the transformation. and the timeline to organize what we've done already and what we will be doing in the future. Thank you, Nishio. Next question from Pedro Leduc with Italo BVA.

speaker
Renato Meloni
Analyst, Autonomy Research

Leduc?

speaker
Ivan Gontijo
CEO, Bradesco Insurance Group

Cool. Thank you. We can hear you. Go ahead. Thank you for the call. And thank you for taking my question. I'd like you to elaborate on the NII dynamic, particularly client NII. The NII in this quarter had a relevant drop, 14% year-on-year, and the NII is still dropping in a similar speed to the past quarters. I know, Andrei, you said first you brought a portfolio, and then we're going to see a positive impact on NII. But thinking about this sequence, it seems to me that the current origination is coming with lower spreads, perhaps because of the line order mix. My rationale is I see payroll deductible loans increasing, but with caps, putting pressure on profitability. You also have the savings account deposits following, corporate segment being very competitive. So as an outsider, it doesn't seem that the portfolio construction is not helping to converge to the guidance. NII, historically, I know a lot has changed, but it was the line item that was always farther from the guidance. And I see you very comfortable maintaining the guidance, particularly for NII. So I'd like to hear from you. Is my interpretation wrong? Are the spreads more pressured, more under pressure? Is it about more mix, more volume? And perhaps a lower AWL will offset a less dynamic NII. It's a long question, but thank you for this question. I guess that At the very end of your question, you kind of gave us the answer because we look at economic value. So we look at the NII, not the gross NII. So in NII, you saw that it's starting to grow, and we'll see that. And if you look at the mix of products, you will see that we boosted those higher risk products, but everyone here is very down to earth. We are not going to have that NPL, that delinquency in the future. On the contrary, and like I said, and I stress this during my presentation, in February, we gained market share. In March, most likely, this will be disclosed by the Brazilian Central Bank tomorrow. And most likely, we also gained market share. You're also right when you say that payrolls, loans and mortgages have lower margins. That is the fact. The margin takes longer to come, but we are also offering products with a higher margin. We grew in February and more in March, and this will have a reflection in April, May, June, July and so on and so forth. As regards to wholesale, you talked about spread. Well, that doesn't exist. That the spread in the wholesale bank is under pressure. It's always been. Here we work with RAR. It's just a return. So our regional managers... Using their phone, the tablet, all their monitors, they see exactly the same thing. They see the RAR history of the client. They can simulate what they need to do to negotiate with the client online, real-time. So, we put pressure on them regarding RAR. They just don't have a deal to add to their portfolio. Today, the market doesn't give you a lot of room to bring those to your portfolio. We also have what we call OPCD for the secondary market, OPCD portfolio. So you see the margin is not coming only from spread. We don't address this operation by operation. We address it by client. So when we have an adequate RAR and relationship, the deal goes through or else they don't have the ability to approve the deal. So there's a rationale here. We implemented this when I was in the whole sale bank together with Bruno and our colleagues there. So this is not new. The margin comes from the whole. We also have private payrolls. We are one of the largest banks. Managing payrolls, this means relationship with large courts, mid-sized enterprises, small enterprises. And we have other businesses that we do around the relationship with legal entities. So revenue doesn't come only from the margin. Now to make up the client NII will grow SMEs because this is added to individuals for us to build up our margin over time. Is that line item challenging? It is. But rest assured, just wait, because we'll get there. But we are looking at MII, net interest income. That is what is important. I have to have a balance between what I do and the potential loss for these clients. And this is our handbook for our day-to-day business. But, of course, the portfolio needs to come first, and the NIA will come later. And we'll keep looking at the mix over time, and we'll see a more balanced mix. But with delinquency under control, we have to have high-quality assets. Okay, Pedro? So we won't make a mistake.

speaker
André Carvalho
Investor Relations Officer, Bradesco

Okay.

speaker
Marcelo Noronha
President & CEO, Bradesco

If you want to add anything, I just have two very brief comments. Pedro's question was more directed to product mix, and as Marcelo was saying, there is also the segment mix. Once we accelerate SME and individuals' mass market, we bring on board more margin. The second comment is about guidance. Let me look at the guidance. The guidance gives us an idea of, you know, profit a year. That's valid. This is what we work with. But in terms of a turnaround history, when we point the guidance towards the end of the year, the beginning of the year is different from the end of the year because you are turning the portfolio. So it's a more classic case. It is more limited, and it turns around, and then it picks up again. So it will be different, you know, if you compare one and another. I mean, it is valid, but there are fluctuations in some possible lines, you know, within a turnaround perspective. Now, Carlos Gomez-Lopez, next question from HSBC. The floor is yours. My question, I have two questions. First is on funding. There was a drop of almost 13% on checking account year on year. When do you intend to change that in terms of cheap funding? The second question is about Next. We don't have a lot of information about the future of Next or the digital platform. Thank you.

speaker
André Carvalho
Investor Relations Officer, Bradesco

Thank you, Carlos.

speaker
Marcelo Noronha
President & CEO, Bradesco

So you start first, and then I'll talk about next. Carlos, thanks. It's a pleasure to see you. Marcelo just said now that one of the important indicators is our cash growth. We are doing some important work with companies and also working with some SMEs that are now coming into our offices. I think that The fair share path is important, and this will strike a balance when it comes to mix or with that demand deposit. We must also remember that we have lots of CDBs, which are some instruments related to demand deposits, and that's not specifically in that same line. I mean, you have a remunerated line, but not to that client. You only see that when you look at the time deposit line. I mean, remuneration is a bit lower. I mean, it's a bit lower in this business. That's why you see this change. But it's not loss, but gain, because the line is not broken down for you to see it more clearly.

speaker
Renato Meloni
Analyst, Autonomy Research

Yeah, I think you're right.

speaker
Marcelo Noronha
President & CEO, Bradesco

In terms of the clients, that is it. And again, the more the client helps itself, it looks for different alternatives. And we will keep seeing these changes. I mean, the first quarter is more seasonal, but we understand that this is quite normal, and within the context of the year, this will be within the lines of what we often do. Now, about Next. Now, to answer your question about Next, with Next, you know that part of the investments are within Bradesco. Digital is totally outside Bradesco. We have decided that Next, would be another segment for us here with a brand that is known in the market. But when we reviewed our strategy and the plan, we decided not to make that move before we would make all the decisions related to that mass segment because we have learnings with NEXT and learnings that come from digital. So we are now in this decision-making process. We have some possible and you will see that in due time. Also, with this new colleague that is arriving, that will certainly help us in this process of execution and decision-making. But if you look at our playbook, you will also see some interesting figures about digital. Take a look at that, because we have some information about digital in our playbook. And thank you for your questions. Thank you. The next question comes from Guilherme Graceman from J.P. Morgan. Thank you for the presentation. Our question is on cost. We already talked a lot about, you know, G&A, et cetera. I would just like to look at orders. This was a controlled, I would say, a controlled quarter. And discussing the guidance with you early this year, I think there was a caution in terms of the total cost of the guidance. Because of that line, guidance was above inflation. And part of the explanation was because you were very cautious about that line throughout the year. But looking at the run rates, for the quarter, if the pace was to be maintained of about 1.5% throughout the year, we would see a drop when compared to 2023. The question is, how could we see this line going forward if the pressure you were anticipating at the beginning of the year is still a base case for the rest of the year? and also exactly what led you to see this more beneficial performance or behavior of the line. Thank you. Andrei, you start and then I will add. My first comment is that there was a very good performance in all the lines of the main operating expenses, personnel, you know, admin and other expenses. Marcelo pointed out quite well that personnel and admin expenses grew 3.5% in the first quarter against an inflation in the first period of 4.3, showing that our expenses are very much under control. So we started off controlling our expenses, and this is our objective. for the rest of the year. But we have to bear in mind that the strategic plan that is started in February 19th has a very small impact in the first quarter. So it's just natural that the impact will grow going forward, an impact that will be felt in technologies, new hirings, contingencies, you know, fiscal contingencies, et cetera. This will appear throughout the year. But this is what... makes us certain that this line will go, you know, within the guidance, but we will certainly do all we can to lower that number. We have to also recall the collective bargaining agreement. I mean, of course, that we have our own impressions about the collective bargaining agreement, but the negotiation remains open. I mean, if you look at the line of others and compare it with the same line, it's the same as other companies that consolidate with us. And this line is going back to its traditional level from previous years without the effects that we had in the past two years. So everything is under control and normal. I mean, the collective bargaining agreement could probably... move the needle a bit, but everything is being looked at and treated very rigorously. As Marcelo was saying, all the lines should be within the guidance. Some lines are even above guidance, but we will see a balance between one and the other. Some will be closer to the bottom part of the guidance, and the others will be more closer to the top of the guidance. But we are certainly controlling our expenses and costs. But at the same time, always investing in what needs to be invested on. So thank you. And with now, we conclude our Q&A session. Questions that couldn't be answered in this occasion can be then sent to our IR department. And before I turn the floor to Marcelo to conclude this presentation, I would just like to say that in our IR website, you will be able to find this presentation and also all of the other materials related to this earnings release presentation. So I just recommend that you take a look at that. So what are your final remarks? Thank you. Thank you, Enver. Thank you, Cassiano. Thank you, all of you, for your interest and for joining us today in this quarterly earnings release. And we remain at your disposal. sell side, all analysts, we are available to give you further information. But before I say farewell, I would just like to say something. Yesterday, Carlos Alberto Rodrigues Guilherme Coca passed away. He was a board member since last December when he retired. He was also vice president of the board. He died yesterday, but for several decades he worked for our organization. That's why I thought it would be important for us to express our sorrow for the loss of our colleague. that spent many years working with us. But I would like to remember him with joy rather than sadness. Thank you so much for joining us today, and I wish you all a very good month of May. Thank you.

Disclaimer

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