Gleisi classifies credit card revolving fees as ‘criminal’

The Minister of the Secretariat of Institutional Relations, Gleisi Hoffmann, criticized the Selic rate this Sunday again, saying that it is “shameful”, and classified the interest rate on the revolving credit card as “criminal”.

“If the Selic rate is shameful, the interest rate on the revolving credit card is criminal: one Selic per month! Installments on the card pay interest of 9.43% and special checks 7.52% per month. Not to mention other loans, including payroll loans. There are no people or countries that can put up with this. They will end the popular economy by increasingly indebting families and workers,” wrote Gleisi on social media.

According to her, all the efforts made by President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva (PT), towards generating jobs and increasing income, are wasting away in the financial gains of the banking system. “We need a civic crusade to face this situation!”, he concluded.

One of the most vocal PT members in the crusade against the current level of the Selic, Gleisi said last Wednesday, the 18th, that the 0.25 percentage point reduction in the rate, without clear signaling of new cuts, was “disappointing”. On that day, the Monetary Policy Committee (Copom) of the Central Bank reduced the Selic from 15% to 14.75% per year, a smaller cut than expected two months ago, due to the outbreak of war in the Middle East and the consequent spike in oil prices.

On the day of the decision, Gleisi said that the country “has already paid too high a price for the contractionary interest rate policy, which is inhibiting investment and inflating public and family debt”. In her view, the uncertainties caused by the war cannot “sustain the prolongation of the suffocation of interest rates and speculative gains”.