ARE THERE DIFFERENCES IN THE FINANCIAL PERFORMANCE OF THE CENTRAL CREDIT UNIONS IN BRAZIL?

The accounting statements are intended to provide information that will enable understanding of the facts in the entities and thus assist decision-making of economic agents. In this sense, the assessment of the financial structure of the central credit unions, which are responsible for assisting the management of credit unions, might can support policies and interventions by the Central Bank as well as assist managers and economic agents operating with these institutions, since the demand for services provided by credit unions has increased significantly, mainly because they offer lower interest rates and charges when compared to services practiced by the banking system. In this sense, this study aimed to assess the financial situation of the 14 central credit unions affiliated to SICOOB using the PEARLS methodology. Studies on credit unions in Brazil focus solely on credit unions, and to date, there has been no financial analysis of the central cooperatives through the PEARLS system. This research can be characterized as descriptive, since it analyzes economic and financial characteristics of the central cooperatives based on their financial statements provided by the Central Bank of Brazil. The results highlight a central credit union which positively excelled over the others, and a negative that case that deserves a thorough analysis of the management process. Additionally, the results demonstrated the viability for the central credit unions to implement the PEARLS system as a tool to aid management that is, nowadays, one of the major challenges for the cooperative credit system.