Market roundup: The Lula effect on education stocks

The election’s effect on shares of education companies

Publicly traded companies in the education sector have seen their share prices soar in September, in anticipation that former President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva could clinch the presidential elections in the first round (which didn’t happen, of course). 

State of play. Firms such as Cogna (which works with primary schools and offers both in-person and remote higher education) and Yduqs (focused on colleges and preparatory courses for professional exams and hiring processes of new civil servants), skyrocketed in September – growing 14 percent and 14.5 percent, respectively.

This represented an important recovery, given the fall in education companies’ shares throughout 2022, which are still feeling the effects of the pandemic.

• However, shares fell again earlier this week, following President Jair Bolsonaro’s stronger-than-expected performance, which will see the election go to a second round. Only Cogna has fully recovered its previous position.

Why it matters. Still the frontrunner, Lula promised greater incentives for student financing programs, such as FIES (which finances up to 100 percent of the value of student tuition at private educational institutions) and ProUni (which pays full or partial scholarships for students who do not meet the Fies financial requirements). 

• During the greater part of the Workers’ Party period in power, these programs played a major role in building titans in the private educational sector.
• This changed in 2015, when Dilma Rousseff’s administration had to cut spending, which led to stricter rules for assessing student financing programs.
• Budget reductions continued in the governments of Michel...