Júlia Rodrigues Coimbra, Larissa Gebrim and Tamiris Guimaraes   In early 2017, BNDES announced new operational policies that will govern financing granted by the bank. This announcement followed a review process looking at BNDES’s manner of operational practices, which began in September of 2016, when the conditions for financing for infrastructure projects were announced...

In early 2017, BNDES announced new operational policies that will govern financing granted by the bank. This announcement followed a review process looking at BNDES’s manner of operational practices, which began in September of 2016, when the conditions for financing for infrastructure projects were announced.

Among the new rules announced by the bank, there has been a trend to qualify projects based on their attributes, as opposed to categorizing them by sectors. In this scenario, financing conditions have started to reflect the attributes and qualifying factors of the projects and not the sectors of the economy to which they relate. Infrastructure projects, however, continue to represent an exception to this rule.

By way of example, for large-scale projects that require financing of R$ 20 million or more, two lines of financing were created, the incentivized line and the standard line, each of which is subdivided into A and B. A project is classified into these different categories based on the presence of certain qualifiers that will determine the maximum share of financing at the Long-Term Interest Rate (TJLP).

Another change identified is the introduction of restrictions on the payment of dividends, beyond the legal minimum, to beneficiaries whose share in the resources financed at the TJLP rate is 50% or more of the total.

Another innovation was the creation of the Monitoring and Evaluation Department, with the main task to evaluate the impact of projects financed with BNDES funds, based on the creation of a 'scoreboard'. Large-scale infrastructure projects may rely on third-party evaluation services.