Credit rating firm Moody’s cut its 2016 global economic growth forecasts, with China and United States both trimmed and Russia and Brazil seen staying in recession.
Brazil's government presented a 2016 budget Monday that for the first time projects the world's seventh largest economy operating in the red, sparking worries that the country's investment grade rating will be put at risk.
Britain's Rolls-Royce is cooperating with investigators in a massive corruption scandal at Brazilian state oil giant Petrobras, a spokesman said. The engineering company confirmed it had been contacted by investigators involved in the probe, which has engulfed Brazil's political and business establishment amid allegations of a massive kickbacks scheme.
President Dilma Rousseff has dropped the idea of reinstating a tax on financial transactions to bridge a gaping fiscal deficit in Brazil after it ran into a barrage of criticism even from within her coalition, Brazilian media reported on Sunday.
Brazil's economy shrank 1.9% in the second quarter, sinking into a recession that has hammered President Dilma Rousseff's popularity. The quarterly contraction, reported by government statistics agency IBGE on Friday, was bigger than what markets expected and confirms the worst slowdown for Brazil in nearly three decades.
The Brazilian government is considering reviving a financial transaction tax known as CPMF in a bid to shore up its finances in 2016, but the initiative apparently does not have sufficient support in Congress and President Dilma Rousseff's main coalition ally, PMDB, is not willing to make the presentation.
Brazil's Senate confirmed the reappointment of Prosecutor General Rodrigo Janot, who is leading a massive corruption investigation that has put dozens of politicians under scrutiny for allegedly receiving kickbacks.
Former two-term President Lula da Silva acknowledged Friday that he is weighing the possibility of seeking to return to Brazil's highest office in the 2018 elections. ”I can't say that I am or that I'm not (a candidate),” Lula said during an interview with Radio Itatiaia.
Brazil and the European Union agreed to hold their annual summit during the first half of 2016, following the exchange of proposals for a wide ranging and cooperation trade agreement between the EU and Mercosur.
Former Brazilian president Lula da Silva, if he decided to run again in 2018 as his Workers Party insists, would lose the presidential contest against any of three potential candidates from the leading opposition party, PSDB, (Brazilian Social Democracy) according to a public opinion poll released this week.