Brazil's industrial output rose in December at its fastest monthly pace in two and a half years, in a likely one-time boost that did not reverse the sharp losses of one of the worst years on record for local manufacturers.
President Michel Temer will propose legislation to lift restrictions on foreign ownership of airlines and agricultural land in Brazil as he strives to pull the economy out of a two-year recession, government sources said on Monday.
Brazil's central government registered a primary budget deficit of 154.255 billion reais (US$49.40 billion) in 2016, meeting its target but recording a third consecutive annual deficit that reflects the dire state of the country's finances. In December, the country posted a primary deficit of 60.124 billion reais (US$19.25 billion).
Former Brazilian billionaire Eike Batista on Monday turned himself in to police in Rio de Janeiro on Monday on charges related to the Petrobras corruption scandal. He was detained shortly after arriving from New York.
The first pictures of a huge coral reef system discovered in the Amazon last year have been released by environmental campaigners. The Amazon Reef is a 9,500 sq km system of corals, sponges and rhodoliths, Greenpeace says. The reef is almost 1,000 km long, and is located where the Amazon River meets the Atlantic Ocean.
The small plane carrying a Brazilian Supreme Court justice overseeing a political bribery investigation did not suffer any obvious mechanical failure when it crashed into a bay amid heavy rain and killed all five on board, investigators said this week.
Brazil's president Michel Temer said that he would wait to name a replacement for the Supreme Court justice who died in a plane crash until after the court reassigns a major corruption case he was handling.
Brazil's President Michel Temer on Thursday evening made an official statement to mourn the death of Supreme Court judge Teori Zavascki, who was killed earlier in the day in a plane crash. Temer declared three days of national mourning in Brazil for the death of the Justice, who was in charge of the court's investigation into a wide-ranging corruption scandal.
Brazil's Finance Minister Henrique Meirelles has admitted that the government is going to revise its official forecast for this year's GDP growth, but gave no details as to the extent of the change. In its latest forecast, the government had estimated the economy was going to grow 1% in 2017.
The Japanese car parts maker Takata has agreed to pay US$1bn in penalties in the US for concealing dangerous defects in its exploding airbags. The firm, which also has assembly plants in Brazil and Uruguay, also pleaded guilty to a single criminal charge, the company and the US Department of Justice said..