Brazil must focus on making difficult fiscal adjustments in order to get economic growth and investment back in gear, the country's new Finance Minister Joaquim Levy said on Monday. At his swearing-in ceremony in Brasilia, Levy said the process will require the participation of society as a whole and will involve changes to taxes and spending, without resorting to accounting shortcuts.
Germany has said it will not be “blackmailed” into renegotiating Greece’s rescue program should a new hard left government take office after elections later this month. The Euro dropped to a nine-year low after a report in Der Spiegel magazine on Monday that Berlin was no longer opposed to Athens leaving the currency bloc.
Argentine farmers exported more than 300 million dollars worth of grains and oilseeds in the last two days of 2014 to help bring in much needed cash for the nation’s central bank. The situation was boosted by an agreement reached between farmers and the Argentine government regarding foreign currency payment for the grains and oilseed.
Latin America and the Caribbean's economic growth might recover modestly to 2.2% in 2015, up from 1.3% in 2014, its lowest rate since last decade's global financial crisis. Despite the slowdown, the region has managed to maintain its gains against poverty, said Inter-American Development Bank President Luis Alberto Moreno.
Tony Mason, Managing Director of the Falkland Islands Tourist Board today discussed plans on marketing to a new generation of travellers.
Magallanes region in the extreme south of Chile reported the lowest unemployment rate in the country, 2.3% during the September-November mobile quarter according to the country's latest release from the Stats Office. This represents 1.8 percentage points less than the same period a year ago (4.1%).
The Euro entered circulation in Lithuania on New Year, bringing the number of European Union (EU) Member States using the single European currency to 19. The European Central Bank (ECB) announced that Lithuania also joined its banking supervision under the Single Supervisory Mechanism.
The euro fell Friday to a 4 ½-year low against the dollar after European Central Bank President Mario Draghi indicated the bank could soon back a government bond-buying program to deal with alarmingly low inflation across the 19-country Euro-zone.
France's influential economist Thomas Piketty, author of the bestseller Capital in the 21st Century, refused to accept the country's highest award, the Legion d'Honneur, arguing it is not the government's job to decide who is honorable and criticizing policies of the current Socialist administration.
The Panama Canal Board of Directors this week formally approved the development and construction of a transshipment port in Panama’s Corozal region. Upon completion, the port will have the capacity to handle more than five million TEUs within a 120-hectare area at the Canal’s entrance to the Pacific. The project is now awaiting the final step for approval from Panama’s National Assembly.