Pursuant to § 4 of Article 157 of Law 6,404/76, dated December 15th, 1976 and according to CVM (Brazilian Securities and Exchange Commission) Regulation 358, dated of January 3rd, 2002, Banco Bradesco S.A. and Banco do Brasil S.A. hereby inform that signed, today, a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with no binding effect, to develop a business model in order to:
• partially integrate the credit and debt card operations from both institutions;
• launch a Brazilian brand for credit, debt and pre-paid cards for account and non-account holders;
• draw, together, new businesses for private label cards (cards offered to non-account holders costumers through retail partners);
• create a company to sell cards for specific groups of non-account holders;
• transfer the shares, owned by Banco Bradesco and Banco do Brasil or their subsidiaries in CBSS S.A. (Visa Vale), to a new company to be created.
The banks inform that they are studying the possibility of transferring their shares held in Cielo S.A. to a new company to be created, observing the interests of controlling shareholders, the requirements of Bovespa´s Novo Mercado and the Cielo´s bylaws.
Once the transaction is effective, the banks intend to create a Holding company that will integrate and manage the businesses listed above.
The creation of the Holding company has the purpose to generate synergies, to structure new private label and other related businesses, and to build up a new business model aiming at distributing cards under a new national brand.
The closing of the deal is subject to technical, legal and financials studies, satisfactory negotiation of definitive documents, and the compliance with applicable regulatory and legal procedures.
Further information will be timely released to the market according to the evolution of the negotiations.