Brazil’s central bank cut its benchmark interest rate on Wednesday to a new low of 6.75%, but hinted it was now done with a historic easing cycle. The bank lowered the Selic rate by 0.25 percentage point, its 11th consecutive cut aimed at helping Latin America’s largest economy emerge from a stifling two-year recession.
Banco Bradesco SA, Brazil's second-largest private-sector lender, appointed a new chief executive who told journalists that demand for credit has already improved in the first month of 2018. Octavio Lazari, 54, head of Bradesco's insurance unit, was appointed as the bank's next CEO amid a broader management shakeup with younger executives joining the board and upper management ranks to tackle increasing competition from all-digital banks.
With Brazil’s unpopular government battling to hold together a congressional coalition, President Michel Temer has been unlucky with his pick of cabinet ministers. Seven quit or were fired in his first year in office, four of them following allegations of wrongdoing. Among them, Geddel Vieira Lima, who was eventually arrested after police identified his fingerprints in an apartment filled with US$16 million in cash.
Brazil’s government has won a court decision allowing the export of live cattle, overturning an injunction obtained by an animal rights group, the Agriculture Ministry said on Monday.
A total of 55 planned and announced floating production, storage, and offloading units (FPSOs) are expected to begin operations by 2022 worldwide, according to a report by GlobalData. In the South American list Brazil figures with 24 FPSOs, plus the Falkland Islands and Guyana with one each.
A Brazilian federal judge ruled on Friday that authorities must return the passport of former President Lula da Silva, seized last week on the order of another court after his conviction for corruption was upheld on appeal. Lawyers for Lula, who governed from 2003-2011, handed over the passport to Brazil’s Federal Police on Jan. 26.
Brazil’s presidential election is up for grabs, according to the latest public opinion poll, with popular ex-president Lula da Silva likely to be barred because of his corruption conviction and half of the electorate responding they want to see him in jail.
Brazilian Finance Minister Henrique Meirelles said on Monday that although there may be differences in strategy between president Michel Temer and the speaker of the House of Representatives, Rodrigo Maia, everyone's goal is to ensure the approval of the pension reform.
The Oil and Gas Climate Initiative (OGCI) and Petrobras announced that the Brazilian company will join the initiative. This commitment is subject to the approval of the OGCI Climate Investments Members’ Agreement by the Petrobras board of directors.
Brazil's popular but scandal-plagued leftist ex-president Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva got an unlikely morale boost on Monday from a political nemesis, current President Michel Temer. Lula easily leads the polls heading to October's presidential election but his dream of returning to office was left in doubt last week after an appeals court upheld an earlier corruption conviction against him.