Casas Bahia has won 180 days of protection from its creditors. On Friday (28), judge Tainá Maria Leonardo de Oliveira of the Sao Paulo court that handles bankruptcies suspended all collection lawsuits and enforcement actions against the group, with effects through February 15, 2027. For shoppers, the practical meaning is simple: stores, the website and installment purchases keep running while the retailer tries to renegotiate R$ 17.3 billion in debt, about US$ 3.3 billion at recent exchange rates, or enough to buy nearly 35,000 homes priced at R$ 500,000 each.
The judicial recovery filing was made on August 16 and covers Casas Bahia plus nine other companies in the group. The debt under negotiation is large even by corporate standards. The 180-day clock started on August 19, when the judge had already granted part of the protections.
What judicial recovery means
In brief: judicial recovery is Brazil's version of Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in the United States. It lets an over-indebted company renegotiate terms, interest and discounts with creditors under court supervision, instead of going bankrupt. The shield granted now is the so-called stay period, a legal truce that suspends collections so the company can breathe; it covers most lawsuits, but not tax collections or credits that Brazilian law keeps outside the process.
A rush of creditors
The ruling follows an alert raised by the company itself. According to the retailer, court-ordered freezes had blocked about R$ 9 million within days, less than 0.1% of the total debt, but a sign of imminent asset depletion in the judge's view.
"The news of the recovery filing triggered a rush of creditors against the group's assets, with court-ordered freezes reaching about R$ 9 million in a few days and an imminent risk of asset depletion," the judge wrote, adding that the danger of damage is "concrete and current".
Before deciding whether to accept the filing for good, the court ordered a preliminary review: a specialized firm will examine the group's documents and finances, with a report due within 30 days. The judge noted that the law allows suspending enforcement even before the formal decision to process the case, as reported by InfoMoney.
The decision also forces banks and payment processors to release the retailer's money. BTG Pactual must restore the company's access to its bank accounts within 24 hours, and card acquirers Cielo, Getnet and Redecard must stop withholding sales proceeds solely because of the filing. Noncompliance carries a daily fine of R$ 100,000, roughly the price of a new economy car in Brazil.
Casas Bahia withdrew its requests against Banco do Brasil, with which it is negotiating a consensual solution, according to news outlet g1. In its initial petition, the company said the bank, a guarantor of contracts with Apple and insurer Mapfre, debited about R$ 422 million from the group's accounts after the guarantees were called. That is nearly 50 times the R$ 9 million blocked in the early rush.
In the stock market, the punishment continues: shares of the retailer (BHIA3, traded in Sao Paulo) fell 56% in August, according to newspaper Estadão. An investor who put R$ 1,000 into the stock at the start of the month had about R$ 440 left by Friday's close. The company blames high interest rates, expensive credit and weak consumer spending for the crisis.
It is the retailer's second attempt to sort out its debts: in 2024 it renegotiated R$ 4.1 billion through an extrajudicial recovery, a deal struck with creditors without going to court. In August it announced the closure of nearly 300 stores and the dismissal of about 3,000 employees, and says the current process aims to preserve more than 20,000 jobs. According to the company, physical stores, e-commerce and other sales channels continue to operate normally.