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Brazil traders see Finance Minister Joaquim Levy’s admission that the government won’t meet its fiscal goals as a bad omen. The real touched a 12-year low, while the Ibovespa led declines among major equity benchmarks after the government asked lawmakers to approve a reduction in its target for the budget surplus before interest payments. The move sparked... Continue Reading →
Oil relapsed into a bear market in New York as resilient U.S. output, rising OPEC supply and threats to Chinese demand keep a global glut in place. West Texas Intermediate futures dropped 1.5 percent Thursday to close at $48.45 a barrel. The grade has lost 21 percent in the past six weeks, meeting the common... Continue Reading →
Brazil's main oil workers union is considering an open-ended strike in September if a 24-hour walkout scheduled for midnight Thursday fails to stop moves to shrink state-run oil company Petrobras, a senior union official said. FUP, which represents platform, refinery and other workers, is fighting plans by Petroleo Brasileiro SA, as Petrobras is known, to... Continue Reading →
A local ratings firm stripped Brazil of its investment grade on Thursday, saying President Dilma Rousseff's new budget savings goals are insufficient to stabilize the country's growing debt burden. Austin Rating, which specializes in rating local financial institutions and companies, cut Brazil's foreign-currency debt to BB-plus, a level considered "junk," and the local-currency debt to... Continue Reading →
Fitch Ratings said on Thursday it will reevaluate Brazil's fiscal trends, which are key for its decision on whether to downgrade the country's credit ratings, after the government slashed its budget savings targets for this year and next. Brazil's new fiscal savings goals are below what Fitch had estimated in April, when it decided to... Continue Reading →
The administration of Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff has shifted into overdrive to diffuse what could become the biggest risk for an impeachment against her -- accusations she doctored her budget results last year. Attorney-General Luis Inacio Adams has filed a 1000-page defense and personally met with the nine members of the audit court, appointed by... Continue Reading →
Finance Minister Joaquim Levy’s proposal to reduce Brazil’s budget savings reflects the hard reality that a contracting economy has forced the government to scale back its ambitions for fiscal retrenchment. Levy said he is targeting a fiscal surplus that excludes interest payments equal to 0.15 percent of gross domestic product this year, a sharp reduction... Continue Reading →
Brazil’s real led global declines as a contracting economy forced Finance Minister Joaquim Levy to dilute the government’s fiscal target, adding to concern that the nation is facing a credit downgrade. The real dropped 1.3 percent to 3.2646 per dollar at 9:17 a.m. in Sao Paulo, the weakest level on a closing basis since March... Continue Reading →
Morgan Stanley has been pretty pessimistic about oil prices in 2015, drawing comparisons to the some of the worst oil slumps of the past three decades. The current downturn could even rival the iconic price crash of 1986, analysts had warned—but definitely no worse. This week, a revision: It could be much worse. Read More
July 22, 2015 — 6:09 PM BRT Brazil will freeze an additional 8.6 billion reais ($2.7 billion) in spending and proposes to reduce the primary surplus target for its 2015 budget to 0.15 percent of gross domestic product, according to a government budget report. The government previously targeted a primary budget surplus, which excludes interest... Continue Reading →
Brazil Energy Insight 