Brazil's GDP fared worse than almost any other major economy in 2015, contracting by 3.8%, according to the national statistics agency IBGE. Economic growth in the world's seventh-largest economy has fallen sharply in recent months, which was due partly to low commodity prices and sluggish global growth.
Elliott Management Corp., a New York-based hedge fund that invested in distressed Argentine government bonds well over a decade ago, will have made a $2.4 billion profit on its wager once this week's settlement is finalized, the Wall Street Journal said.
French President Francois Hollande has said he wants the UK to stay in the EU - and warned of the consequences for immigration and the economy of leaving. A French government minister earlier suggested his country could end UK border controls in Calais.
The Argentine Coast Guard and Uruguayan navy failed in capturing a Chinese flagged jigger poaching in the two countries shared waters. According to non official reports, two Argentine Coast Guard vessels and a helicopter plus a Uruguayan aircraft and vessel were involved in the attempt to arrest Hua Li 8.
Executives from Brazil's second-largest engineering company, Andrade Gutierrez have testified that the company paid suppliers for President Dilma Rousseff's 2010 electoral campaign off the books, newspaper a Folha de S.Paulo reported on Tuesday.
Brazil's state-run oil company Petrobras may be forced to pay 7.3 billion Reais (US$1.9 billion) in back taxes and fines after a decision by the country's tax authority Carf, newspaper Valor Economico reported on Wednesday.
The government of President Dilma Rousseff has raised from 20% to 49% the maximum stake that foreign companies can hold in Brazilian airlines, according to an executive order signed by the president and published on Wednesday in the Diario Oficial, Official Gazette
Argentine president Mauricio Macri is scheduled to receive in a week's time the European Union head of foreign affairs, Federica Mogherini who is expected to announce that all is ready to begin, next April, formal negotiations for the long-delayed trade and cooperation agreement between Mercosur and the EU.
Brazil's central bank kept interest rates on hold on Wednesday as widely expected, opting to avoid inflicting more harm on an economy mired in its worst recession in decades despite a surge in inflation. In a split vote, the bank's monetary policy committee, Copom, kept its benchmark Selic rate at 14.25% for the fifth straight time.
A judge sided with Argentina in its debt standoff on Wednesday, agreeing to let orders protecting creditors expire so that large U.S. hedge funds and smaller entities and people can be paid at least US$6.2 billion to satisfy settlements reached over the last month.