Bradesco Asset Management, Brazil’s third-largest fund manager, has significantly expanded its private credit team over the past two years amid a surge in inflows from a thriving corporate-debt market, according to a report by Bloomberg.
The asset-management arm of Banco Bradesco SA has seen net inflows of BRL45bn ($8.2bn) from January to then end of July, with credit products contributing to about 90% of this total, according to Bruno Funchal, the company’s chief executive officer. This figure is already triple the total inflows for all of last year.
With interest rates remaining high for longer than many had expected, investors in Brazil are increasingly turning to credit funds. So far this year, companies have issued BRL263.9bn in local debt, nearly double the amount issued in the same period last year, according to Bloomberg data. The credit-fund industry recorded net inflows of BRL163.5bn in the first half of the year, driven in part by changes in tax regulations, according to SulAmerica Investimentos.
Bradesco Asset Management’s private-credit team has grown from 10 to 20 members since 2022 and now manages BRL300bn in private credit. The firm has launched several new credit funds, including a high-yield fund and a Fiagro fund focused on agribusiness credit and also has plans to introduce additional credit and quantitative funds, as well as a real estate-focused fund.
In a strategic move earlier this month, Bradesco hired Gabriel Trebilcock, a founding partner of hedge fund Ace Capital, to lead the treasury desk’s local credit sales and trading business. The lender aims to double revenue from this division within two years.
