Lula's Surprise Election Win Sends Itaú Unibanco Down 24%
ITUB is trading near its 52-week low of $6.816 (9.9% above the low) on elevated volume (3.0× avg).
Summary
Lula won Sunday's runoff with 51.8% of the vote against Flávio Bolsonaro's 48.2%, reversing bets on a rightward shift and tighter fiscal policy. Brazilian assets sold off hard: the Tokyo-listed Ibovespa ETF fell as much as 16% and real futures dropped roughly 10% in Asian trading. Itaú shares were down 23.78% at $7.37 at publication, a proxy for Brazil financial-system risk given its dominant domestic franchise. Separately, Itaú disclosed it will buy AI startup NeoSpace for BRL 2.925 billion (~$580 million) in cash, with part deferred over five years, to bolster its in-house AI and the ia.i assistant. The election shock dwarfs the deal; the stock had rallied 12% over the past month on expectations of a Bolsonaro win, and that positioning is now unwinding. Q3 earnings are due Nov. 3, with consensus at 22 cents per share on $9.53 billion in revenue.
At the time of this announcement, ITUB was trading at $7.49 on NYSE in the Finance sector, with a market capitalization of approximately $112.3B. The 52-week trading range was $6.82 to $10.20. This news item was assessed with negative market sentiment and an importance score of 9 out of 10. Source: Benzinga.