Good
morning, ladies and gentlemen. Thank you for standing by, and welcome to Itauza's Conference Call to discuss the First Half of twenty nineteen Results. At this time, all participants are in a listen only mode. Later, we will conduct a question and answer session and instructions will be given at that time. As a reminder, this conference is being recorded.
The file will be available at the company's website at ww.itauza.com. Bren at the Investor Relations section. This conference call and the slide presentation are being transmitted via Internet as well. You can access the webcast by logging on to the company's website, www.itauza.com. Bren.
Before proceeding, let me mention that forward looking statements are being made under the Safe Harbor of the 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, questions can be sent by webcast and it will be answered in the Q and A session. With us today, we have Mr. Alfredo de Giusetubo, CEO and Investor Relations Officer at Itauza Mr.
Eiji Pensions, Chairman of the Board of Director at Itauza Mrs. Priscilla Greco Toledo, CFO at Itauza Mr. Bruno Saleng Brasil, Investor Relations Manager at Itauza Mr. Aleksandro Broedo, Executive Finance Director and Investor Relations Officer at Itau Unibanco Mr. Guilherme Sotuba Souza Isilva, Investor Relations at New Business Manager at Dura Tex
Carlos Bial, Investor Relations Manager at El Pargatas. It is now my pleasure to turn the call over to Mr. Alfredo. Sir, you may now begin.
Good morning. It's a pleasure to be here again to talk about the results and the strategy of Itauza for the coming years and semesters. For those who are following through the Internet, we are on page three. A little bit about us. Just to remember, Itauza is a a public holding company that controls several companies, including Itauoni, Banco do Latex, Alpargatas, and MTS.
We are present in more than 20 countries considering all these companies, And we have a focus on on strengthening our management and a long term view on value creation of our portfolio. It also is the eighth largest company, in the Bovisa, and we have a very high dividend yield, that we are going to talk later, around 9% considering the dividend that we announced yesterday. All the companies that we have participation have very strong brands. Itau itself, Itau Personali, there is a and private banking, there are high end individuals, Ready, Itau Card. In the case of Duratex, we have DECA in in appliance, DuraFloor for flooring, hydra for logos.
Valves. For valves. And also Porcinari, that is a company that we just bought in the ceramic business that we are investing in in Duratex. In the case of Pargatas, of course, we have Hawaiianas and Oskaline that is a premium fashion brand. Going to Page five, we are going to talk briefly because all these companies already made their are listed and already made their conference calls in the last weeks.
So we go to Page six, the highlights for the Itau results. Always remembering that Itau's numbers, in the case of the bank, doesn't match exactly because Itau's used the IFRS numbers, and Itau released their numbers under the Central Bank rules for accountability for accounting. We continue to grow our loan portfolio among individuals and small and mid sized companies. We continue to have hedge our payment company with a very in a very competitive environment with all the companies fighting very hardly to gain market share impose their brands under these markets. It's a completely different market when we compare to some years ago when we bought the totality of the shares of Regi.
And we announced changes in our commercial policies during this quarter to really be more competitive among all these new entrants in this sector. The bank continued to pay dividends. We are creating more capital than we need in the circumstance of the Brazilian economy, especially related to credit. So the bank announced €8,500,000,000 dividends in this period. They continue to be a high yield also for the bank.
The bank continues to be very active in the digital transformation of the system with huge investments in technology, in products to serve better and cheaper, our clients. We have almost 12,000,000 individual clients using the digital channels offered by the bank. We opened 205,000 accounts through our app, digital app. So there is more much more simple and easy for the clients to open an account with us. And of course, as I said, we continue to invest a lot in technology this year to reduce costs and produce more products and technology and apps for our clients using always the brand Itau, to compete in this new environment, of digital transformation in the system that we are seeing here in Brazil and in most of the countries around the world.
The portfolio for low end and small companies increased in the last twelve months, 18.4% and individual, 13.6%. Large companies are using less because they are making less investments also, less demand for credit because the economy is not very not hit at all. More important for the company and according the strategy of the company to increase our share in these markets. The JV with lending related to pulping's dissolving pulp, we already have the permit to start the the project from the authorities. So we started this month, some months before project, the the first infrastructure in the site in Minas Gerais.
We are completing probably in this third quarter, the expansion of Sehuza, doubling the capacity in ceramic tiles. And probably, this new plant will start producing commercial producing in the beginning of the fourth quarter of this year. In terms of use of assets, we like we made in the last quarters that we sold forests and lands for Suzano that were in excess for the wood business. We closed a factory for our panels here in the state of Sao Paulo. And now we announced at the close to shutdown factory in the South Of Brazil related to bathroom porcelain that we are going to transfer the production of these of these units to other fabrics or other units of Duratex, and we are going to to close definitive and send the the the factory in the South.
So, this means more gains in the result of course, for the for the design of As I said, we have some nonrecurrent deals like the sale of the lands and and forest to Suzano. So this year, when we compare the results, we have some decrease, also in the ROE. But, this year, Dora Tex is in line with the budget that was approved by the Board of Directors in the end of the year. So we're not expecting a very heated economy. So the numbers are still in line with the budgets that we project for the company.
And the same for the EBITDA that continues to be in line with the projections that we have. On Page eight, Alparagatas that released results and made a conference call yesterday. Alparagazes had a very good quarter, the second quarter. We continue to change manage we continue to make changes in the in the company in terms of culture, people. We changed the management in the North America operation.
We started off a JV in India. We are starting business in China. So the company is doing their plan to be more international, use more technology, especially e commerce with deals with Amazon, Alibaba, and others to increase the sales of especially Havana's in the international market. So the company had a double digit revenue growth. This when we compare to year on year driven by Avanas.
All the business of Aparagatas did well when we compare twelve months. Avanas, of course, is the biggest by far business of Corgattas. But Mizuno, Oskaline also increased their sales and increased their e commerce. So the results increased also 31.5%. ROE reduced because we had some nonrecurrent last year, and we made some impairments this year, this quarter related to the sale of assets in Argentina related to take to the textile business of Argentina that we announced and sold for $14,400,000, and, we announced that some weeks ago.
So the company had a very good quarter. The share, had a good the markets received very well the the results, and we are very happy with the investment, and we continue to see very good years coming for for for the company. On page nine, we started to talk about NTS. NTS is for a stake in the gas pipeline that we bought some years ago. I think the company continues to present results a little bit over the numbers that we considered when we bought this investment.
The company had revenues of BRL2.2 billion and a net income of BRL1.1 billion. And we received in the first of this year, $2,019,000,000 in dividends. Going to Page 11, main events of Itauza in this first semester. We declared 2,900,000,000.0 dividends, yesterday. Is going to be paid on the twenty third of this month with the stock holding position of August 15.
This dividend make the dividend yield considering the last twelve months and considering the dividend that we announced yesterday, a dividend yield of 9.1% for the shareholders. That is very good and very high, especially when we compare to the SELIC rate that is 6% here in Brazil. We achieved almost 250,000 individual shareholders by the June. This number today is already higher than that. So our liquidity also increased.
Our market share is BRL108 billion by the June. We in terms of sustainability and corporate governance, we released for the first time the integrated report, that was published. The the first holding company publishing, this kind of report, in Latin America. And also, we created here at Itauza a social impact committee, to to follow the investments in social, cultural, miento, of the companies, that Itauza has participation. We increased our share in the We increased by 0.9, almost 1%.
We bought that in the stock market in an auction of a minority shareholders that decided to sell to sell their stakes in the company, and we, use this to buy back, to buy shares, in the market, increasing our position and showing our confidence in the future of the company. We merged Itau Tech and with Itau Tech now is 100% of Itau and we already, this listed Itau Tech from the markets. And our Itauza Imprudentes, there was a subsidiary that all the people and all the employees and all everything was made through them. So this company will be 100% Itauza investments by the end of this month. This company, this subsidiary will not exist from September.
This is the objective is to reduce costs of the holding and give more transparency in terms of numbers, expenses and administrative expenses for our investors. On Page 12, numbers of Iqalusa in the June. So net income increased 10.7%. Always remember that is in IFRS numbers 4,900,000,000.0, an increase of 10.7%. ROE increased from BRL 17,600,000,000.0 to BRL 18,700,000,000.0, and recurring ROE increased from 17.1% to 17.8%.
Total assets, billion dollars of that, R52 billion are shareholders' equity. The payout in this page does not include the dividend that we announced yesterday. So that's the difference of numbers that appears in 9.1, I guess, 8.2 in this page. We continue to distribute
Ladies and gentlemen, please hold. Speakers, you may proceed.
Sorry. I can go from here. Starting on really starting on Page 15, the portfolio of Itauisa. The sum of the parts in which the company listed, BRL138 billion. If I was already trading at BRL108 billion, that means that there is a discount of 21.821.8% when you compare with some of the parts and the market value.
Rate is really increasing year by year. We came from an average of BRL 156 in 2017. And this year, the average daily trading is BRL $390,000,000. That's a very good number. We don't have a UBR listed in the in any of the international exchanges.
Year, I recommend deeply recommend reading of the report because it explains how Ipalu is taking sufficient, strategic decision in MMA, investing, divesting, how we value into the the company that we participate in terms of strategy, capital, culture, people. So it's very interesting reason for those who are interested in investing or already invest in Italian partners. On Page 17, our performance in the capital market is top market. So we have good returns considering then five years and this year return for our shareholders in the year, 15.4% a year, five years, 23.1% and for that twelve months, 52%. So at the used for the investors.
We seen this presentation, and we are open for questions for
Our first question comes from Adriana de los Abba, Scotiabank.
Good morning, and congratulations on the results. I just wanted to know a bit more information about potential acquisition of the Petrobras subsidiary. I wasn't able to hear very well the last part of the presentation. So I don't know if you already mentioned it, but if you can give us more details about that. I believe it was postponed.
And, yes, any information helps. Thank you.
Brianna, it's Jose speaking. We have many NDAs signed up with many companies, looking for alternatives for good investments that really can create value for our investors and the policies that we have to find good business for for the for our portfolio that we are trying to build the current deals. As as you know, the deal Wikidrand that's postponed for this week. We are following this business, but we are not totally involved in business for the for the the company. But we are following the the rules, the consortium, and we are interested in in with it's been high and on other conditions to consider the stake in the company.
But today, we have no news about that. We continue to follow and continue to talk, but we have yet no nothing today about the potential deal that will come from from Petrobras. I have also remembered that the the convenience of this sale from Petrobras is under the special rules of that in terms of participation of the members of the consortium and so on. So there is a lot of movement in consortium that we are in. But today, we have no nothing no no news, nothing to really to say about the the eventual classification of the.
Got it. Thank you very much.
This concludes today's question and answer session. Mr. Alfred, at this time, you may proceed with your closing statements.
Challenging moment for all the companies in Brazil now are good. I mean, we think we are making our homework and preparing the Brazilian company that we have a stake for a period of growth that probably will come in Brazil in the coming years, reducing costs, investing in productivity, investing in new companies like DuraTech in securities and looking for new investments that make sense now to volume. So I think that is a good moment with shares, increasing our number of shareholders and liquidity. There is a good payout. So we are very happy with the ownership the company and wait to talk with you again in our next conference call.
Thank you.
That does conclude our Itauza twenty eighteen results conference call. Thank you very much for your participation. You may now disconnect.