Banco Cooperativo Sicredi
Contact: Lucas da Rosa Ferreira
Country: Brazil
Award Category: Community Uplift
Tell how you've used SAS to have a positive impact on your community.
At Sicredi, a leading credit union in Brazil, we have harnessed the power of SAS to make a real difference in our community. With a total credit portfolio of R$ 223.5 billion, our presence in the state of Rio Grande do Sul alone accounts for 29.7% of this figure.
In May 2024, our community faced one of the worst environmental catastrophes in Brazil's recent history. A series of unprecedented floods affected more than 2 million people in 95% of the cities in Rio Grande do Sul and displaced over 420,000 citizens. Many residents lost their homes as streets transformed into rivers. The entire state experienced issues with communication, water, and electricity supply. The state capital, Porto Alegre, was severely impacted, with extensive flooding in most areas of the city, rendering over 60 streets completely inaccessible. Salgado Filho International Airport was also completely flooded, making air access to the city impossible and land access very difficult. The floods affected 336 cities, with Sicredi operating in 329 of them, accounting for 23% of the company credit portfolio. In some of these cities, Sicredi is the sole financial institution present. As the impact of the floods varied across cities, accurately estimating and centralizing information regarding the vulnerability of our credit portfolio became a significant challenge. Several questions needed to be addressed: How many customers were affected? To what extent were they affected? How many branches were inoperable? What was our credit share in those areas? Was the implemented liquidity control appropriate for the situation?
With the support of SAS, our trusted ally in organizing and classifying our customers' data, from registry datasets to geolocation information, we were able to more accurately estimate the impact of the climate crisis on our operation. This was a crucial step in applying proper risk management, meeting legal obligations, and attracting new resources in partnership with other financial institutions. Thanks to the invaluable assistance of SAS, we successfully maintained our business operations and provided essential support to the most affected communities through our local branches. Due to our prompt response, we were able to maintain our ratings with all Credit Rating Agencies during the flood crisis. We even received a rating upgrade from Fitch by the end of the same year.
What SAS products are you using and how are you using them?
We rely on SAS Enterprise Guide (SAS-EG), our go-to software for data management, to centralize information about our credit portfolio and customer data. During the flood crisis, we utilized SAS-EG to create a centralized dataset that enabled us to assess the size of the tragedy’s impact on our credit portfolio and branch operation. This was crucial in consolidating information from our customers spread across over a hundred datasets covering several risk management topics. The SAS Macro Language played a vital role in accurately applying business rules, allowing us to estimate our operational risk based on the severity of the impact in the affected areas. This centralized information was key to building dashboards that provided daily monitoring of the flooding impact in our business in order to support decision-making.
With SAS-EG as our cornerstone, we have not only effectively managed our credit risks but also gained valuable insights that have helped us navigate through challenging times. At Sicredi, we take pride in our partnership with SAS, as it enables us to make a positive impact on our community.
