Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. Thank you for standing by. Welcome to Itaúsa's Conference Call to discuss the first half of 2021 results. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. Later, we will conduct a question-and-answer session. Instructions will be given at the time. Should you require assistance during the call, please press star followed by 0. As a reminder, this conference is being recorded. A file will be available at the company's website at www.itausa.com.br/en at the Investor Relations section. This conference call and the live presentation are being transmitted via internet as well. You can access the webcast by logging on to the company's website, www.itausa.com.br/en. Before proceeding, let me mention the forward-looking statements are being made under the safe harbor of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1996.
Actual performance could differ materially from that anticipated in any forward-looking comments as a result of macroeconomic conditions, market risks, and other factors. I inform that during the presentation, the questions can be sent by webcast and will be answered at the section of questions and answers. With us today, we have Mr. Alfredo Egydio Setubal, CEO and Investor Relations Officer at Itaúsa; Mrs. Priscila Grecco Toledo, CFO at Itaúsa; Mr. Renato Lulia Jacob, Head of IR and Market Intelligence at Itaú Unibanco; Mrs. Mariana Espírito Santo, Investor Relations Director at Alpargatas; Mrs. Natasha Utescher, Investor Relations Manager at Dexco. It's now my pleasure to turn the call over to Mrs. Priscila. Mrs. Priscila, you may now begin.
Hello. Good morning. It's a pleasure to receive all of you in our conference call to discuss our results of the first semester of this year. Now, beginning on page 5, regarding the pandemic scenario, Itaúsa and our invested companies continue to adopt all the security measures regarding our employees and operations, adopting the home working scheme since the beginning of the pandemic and many well-being programs. In order to help the society surpass this difficult moment, Itaúsa and the companies in our portfolio made donations of more than BRL 1.5 billion last year. This year, the companies of our portfolio had also other relevant initiatives, such as the creation of the Instituto Todos pela Saúde with an initial contribution of BRL 200 million and donations of food staples, Havaianas sandals, and many other initiatives.
On page 6, we show some relevant advances that we had in our governance with the election of three independent members and also the creation of four advisory committees reporting to the board of directors, which are coordinated by independent and external members of the board. On page 7, we show some important improvements in the company to increase our transparency and to reinforce the dialogue with our stakeholders. We launched our integrated report in the first quarter of this year with a new format, more user-friendly, with new content, and also a new identity. We also launched this semester our new corporate website and our Instagram profile, bringing some top content and more interactivity with our stakeholders. Coming soon, we will have a new newsletter with a modern, simple, and objective language, bringing some important topics regarding Itaúsa and our portfolio.
On page 8, some important recognition we had recently. Itaúsa received the Great Place To Work certification, recognizing the work we have been done in terms of people management. We had an overall 21% satisfaction rate from our employees, which is a big number and made us very happy with this result. We appeared for the second time in the FTSE4Good Index. This is a London Stock Sustainability Index and recognize our ESG practices. Going to page 10. We see some important advances in our invested company, Copa Energia. The company launched a new brand with the proposal to be a benchmark in sustainable energy solutions. It is also making advances in the synergy integration and capture process.
Copa already concluded the system integration, implemented the new corporate governance, finalized some commitments assumed with CADE, renegotiated agreements targeting cost reduction and SG&A rationalization, and also is starting the logistic flow rationalization process. On page 11, we comment about some recent advances regarding Itaú Unibanco's stake in XP Inc.. On May 31st, Itaú got Fed's approval for the spin-off, resulting in the creation of XPart, which is now a new company in our portfolio and the second biggest investment in terms of market value. As I already announced, in terms of next steps, we will have the shareholders meeting in the second semester to approve the merge of XPart into XP Inc., and if approved, Itaúsa, IUPAR, and also the ADR role holders will receive Class A shares. The ratio of exchange of shares may be around 43 shares of XPart to one share of Class A of XP Inc..
After the merge, Itaúsa will have a stake of around 15% of XP Inc., this represents a market value of $18 billion in total as of today. Going to the next page 12, we comment about our new investment in Aegea. This investment resulted in an investment amount of BRL 2.5 billion in July, now we have almost 13% of the total capital of the company. We understand that the infrastructure sector has high growth potential and attractive return rates, the company is very well-positioned to benefit from the sector growth. Also, we have a very skilled operator as our partner with a long-term vision that is common with Itaúsa. Aegea is also the leading private company of the base sanitation sector in Brazil and serves around 21 million inhabitants in Brazil. On page 14, we see some highlights of Itaú Unibanco in the semester.
The loan portfolio increased around 12% in the period, mainly in the very small and middle-market companies, and also in individuals. We also saw a relevant decrease of more than 25% in the expected loss when compared with last year related to the credit portfolio. In the semester, Itaú Unibanco showed solid results, increasing the recurring net income from BRL 7.6 billion to BRL 13.8 billion, achieving a ROE of 19% in the period. On page 15, we see some highlights of Copagaz that we now have in our portfolio since the beginning of June, registering one month of the results of this company at Itaúsa. The company showed a 54% increase in its net revenues in the period, driven by their sale business. The net income achieved around BRL 1.7 billion in the first semester against BRL 0.9 billion last year, reporting ROE of almost 29% in the period.
On page 16, we have some highlights of Alpargatas. The company had a net revenue increase in all operations, mainly due to the RGM program, higher volumes, and also better price mix for all the divisions, and some very important advances also in the global expansion and growth of the online channels. The company reported a recurring net income of BRL 246 million, an increase of more than 120% when compared with last year, and reported ROE of 16.7% in the first semester. On page 17, we see some highlights of Dexco. That is the new name of Duratex. The net revenues of the company increases almost 70% in the first half of this year, driven by the maintenance of high level of demand and higher average price and a better mix of products and revenues.
The recurring net income was also almost BRL 900 million of high and an increase of more than 560%, achieving a ROE of almost 18% in the semester. This was the best result in the semester and the best ROE of the company in its history. Going to the next page 18, we see some highlights of Copa Energia. The company had an increase of 20% in its revenues in the period when compared to the last year and reported a loss in the period of BRL 19 million. This was caused by the relevant increase in the cost of raw materials occurred in the semester, with successive price increases made by Petrobras, which was not fully compensated by the company. On page 19, we have some highlights of NTS that reported an increase of more than 20% in its revenues as a result of contractual adjustments by inflation.
The company reported a net income of BRL 1.5 billion in the semester, an increase of 26% when compared with last year. Going to page 21, we have the financial highlights of Itaú. Itaú reported a recurring net income of BRL 5.3 billion, a recurring ROE of almost 18%, which represented a relevant increase in comparison to the last year. We also reported a net debt of BRL 3.9 billion and a net equity of BRL 6.1 billion. On page 22, we see our capital structure. After the debentures we issued in the semester and in the last year, at the end of the last year, to fund Copagaz and also the Aegea investment, we now have a 5.6% leverage showing our high leverage capacity and the prudent financial management of the company. On page 23, we have the payment schedule of the principal amount of our financial debt.
As you see, the average term of our debt is six years, and the cost is around CDI plus 1.6%. On page 24, we see the dividend and interest on capital that we received in the first half of the year from NTS and Itaú Unibanco, and the amount we paid or will pay to our shareholders regarding the first semester of the results of the company. In this semester, the amount paid or payable totalized BRL 1.4 billion with a 25% payout, which represents 2.7% dividend yield in the period. We also acquired 4 million preferred shares under our buy-back program in this semester. On next page 25, we show the current level of discount of Itaúsa. That is almost 24% discount.
If we include the market value of our stake in XP, which is BRL 18 billion, without changing the market value of Itaú and Itaúsa in this exercise, the discount level of Itaúsa goes to almost 24%. In the next page, to conclude my presentation, I would like to invite all of you to our live event, the Panorama Itaúsa. That will take place on September 28th at 10:00 A.M. Brazilian time. In this live, you will have the opportunity to discuss the perspectives and strategies of Itaúsa and the investment company. We now open for the Q&A session. Thank you.
Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, we'll now begin the question- and- answer session. If you have a question, please press the star key followed by the one key on your touch-tone phone now. If at any time you would like to remove yourself from the questioning queue, press the star key followed by the two key. Please restrict your question to two at a time. Our first question comes from Mr. Tito Labarta with Goldman Sachs.
Hi, good morning. Thank you for the call and for taking my question. A couple questions. I guess first on the stake in XP, you mentioned here that you'll be limited to six block trades over 12 months. Any indication you can give in terms of the timing to exit? I think you said in the past that you don't see it as strategic, but you may not sell immediately. Is there any limitation on the size of those blocks that you could sell? My second question more on the pending tax reform. Any color you can provide on, given the current iteration that's going through Congress, what would be your expectations for the impact that that would have on you? Thank you.
Hello, Tito. It's Alfredo. Thank you for the participation and for the questions. In the case of XP, we see XP as a very good investment in our portfolio. We believe in the future of the company, we believe the company will continue to grow. I think the divesting decision of the bank was to pass to the shareholders the value creation that was done during the period that the bank hold this stake. Saying that, we are not in a hurry to sell the participation that we have at XP. We announced that there is not a strategic investment. That's only why we are in a portfolio management activity that is out of the financial services investment that we are doing. XP is part of a financial service company, is a financial service company, so in a long term, we don't see this investment as strategic for Itaúsa.
Itaúsa wants to continue the creation of the new portfolio in other sectors instead of the financial services. We are not intending to sell XP participation fast. We have many years to do that. We are not in a hurry to do that. When we mention that we made with XP Inc., some way out through block trades and other kinds of operations, is just to have the chance and the opportunity to decide if we want or not to participate or do these kinds of block trades or sales depending on the transaction that are being doing through XP, through other investors, through Itaúsa. We have the opportunity to decide if we want to do or not. It doesn't mean that we are going to do.
Our intention is to keep this investment for some periods and use the money from the sales that will occur over the years to pay debt or to pay dividends or to invest in other companies or to buy back shares. We, at the level of the board member, will discuss which one of these alternatives will be the best use of this capital, always looking to the return for our shareholders. It's a medium to long time investment in our portfolio, but we believe that at the end of some many years, we are not being shareholders of XP anymore.
In the case of the tax reform that are under discussion in the Congress, I think it is too early to say because there are many discussions for what will be approved or not, what will be approved in the lower house, what will be approved in the upper house, in the Senate. I think it is a little bit early to say. What we can say, if the law is approved as it is today, it is not bad for Itaúsa specifically, because we are not going to have the fiscal expenses of the PIS/COFINS over the JCP or interest over capital that we receive. This range depends on the year of the payout of the companies that we invest. In the last years, the range was BRL 300 million-BRL 500 million in expenses.
This was the most important expense of the holding that it maybe can disappear with the end of JCP. We see for Itaúsa, probably the results of the companies that we invest will increase due to the level of profitability of them, and also because of the reduction of the taxes paid by the companies. At the end, of course, we will have taxes over the dividends to be paid to the shareholders. If you will look only for the company before distribution of dividends, the results of Itaúsa probably will grow.
Thanks, Alfredo. That's very helpful. just one follow-up on the XP. my sense is you're not selling for now. was there any limitation on the size of any block trade, or if you wanted to sell in one block trade, given the size, it may be difficult, but just to get a sense, any limitation on that? that'll be completely up to you and the board to decide on how quickly you get out once you decide to do that, and I understand it's not in the short term.
As I said, let's put it the other way. We intend to keep a shareholder of XP for a long time. We are going to reduce over the coming years, according to the price, to the perspectives of the company, to the liquidity of the market. Many factors will influence our decision to sell or not to sell any stake in XP in the coming years. It's difficult to give you a precise answer. Anyway, as I said, we are happy and confident with the future of the XP, and we will reduce the participation because it's not strategic for Itaúsa that wants to create a portfolio of non-financial companies. The only financial that we see in our portfolio in the future is the shares of Itaú Unibanco Holdings.
XP will be reduced our stake over the years according to the liquidity and perspectives of the company.
Perfect. Very helpful. Thank you, Alfredo.
This concludes today's question- and answer session. Mrs. Priscila, at this time, you may proceed with your closing statements.
Okay. We'd like to thank you all for the participation in this call. As you saw, Itaúsa reported solid results showing an important increase against the last year. I would like to invite you once more for our live Panorama Itaúsa that will take place on September 28th, where we will share with all our investors the strategy and perspectives of Itaúsa and the companies of our portfolio. Thank you, and have a good day.
That does conclude our Itaúsa's 2021 results conference for today. Thank you very much for your participation.