Threat of the IPI didn't help

Surrounded by journalists at the press conference given on Monday to confirm the maintenance of the current discounts in the tax on industrialized products (IPI) until the end of the year, the Finance Minister, Guido Mantega, confessed that he didn't even remember more when this benefit was granted. "Kicked" July 2013, but was wrong, lost in a timeline that lasts more than two years after successive schedule changes that extended the measure.
Actually, it all started in May 21, 2012, when Mantega announced the cut in the tribute-half until all the aliquots-to take the sector from the quagmire. The same expedient was adopted during the financial crisis of 2008 and returned to the scene because, at the time, sales fell more than 3% and showed production falling more than 10%, since automakers slacked off the pace to bring down stocks.
Since then, this was the sixth time that the Government secure the discounts on IPI, but with a difference compared to previous situations: consumers flocked to dealerships to anticipate purchases because, apparently, are more interested in following the games of the World Cup.
Consumption tends to be strong when there is the possibility of withdrawal of incentives. In the current cycle of exempting sales of cars, this happened in August, October and December 2012, as well as December 2013-all among the best months to sell vehicles in the country. The exceptions were March 2013, when the licenses were below 270 thousand cars, and, now, the June performance.
Initially, the discounts in the IPI, which came to zeroing the tribute of the popular, would last three months. So, faced with the imminent resumption of full rates in September, August 2012 was the best month ever for the industry, with more than 405 thousand units sold, or 420 thousand, if included in the trucks and buses.
After new threat of withdrawal in October, leading to sales of 327 thousand cars, discounts were held until December of that year, when were licensed 343.8 thousand passenger cars and lightweight utilities on the fourth best result of all time.
So, combined with measures to unlock the credit, as cuts in the tax on financial operations (IOF) and compulsory releases, the IPI reduction was effective in reversing the negative trajectory shown in early 2012 and secured another record year, the ninth followed, sales of vehicles, although insufficient to reverse the fall in production.
At the turn of 2012 to 2013, began the process of re-composition of the IPI and, with it, the accommodation of consumption, because the consumption did not show the same shopping potential.
From zero, the rate of popular cars, the 1.0 engine, up to 2%, while the models of the range greater than 1.0 to 2.0, track where is concentrated the bulk of the market, were discharged from 5.5% to 7%. A new round of increase was expected in the second quarter until the full recovery of the tax in July 2013. But, the view that the market was losing force, the Government decided to maintain these percentages until the end of the year, when the Brazilian vehicle market, after becoming the fourth-largest in the world, recorded the first decline in a decade.
In January this year, the IPI is back up, but no return to full schedule rates. The rate of 1.0 3% for cars and models until 2.0 has reached 9%.
And two years after the Government cut the tax, the automakers are returning to the same situation as a starting point. Sales fall to lower levels to 2012, stocks are higher than normal, the production goes back more than 13% and the industry complains about the high selectivity of banks in credit release. The maintenance of the IPI the way was since the beginning of the year, at least, can avoid the aggravation of the crisis.