Brazil

• Sunday, January 25th 2009 - 20:00 UTC

  Petrobras ignores crisis and increases investments 55%

  

  At a time when large raw materials companies around the world are cutting back budgets in the face of falling prices and demand Brazil's government managed oil and gas corporation Petrobras announced a 55% increase in its five year investment plan.

• Thursday, January 22nd 2009 - 20:00 UTC

  Brazil targets growth and cuts basic rate one full point

  

  Brazil's Central bank reduced its benchmark SELIC interest rate a full point to 12.75% on Wednesday, its biggest cut since December 2003. Policy makers slashed the Selic rate by 1 percentage point to its lowest level since March 2007, when Brazil was still enjoying a boom that ended abruptly with the global economic crisis late last year.

• Thursday, January 22nd 2009 - 20:00 UTC

  Exxon finds evidence of oil in Brazil's pre-salt basin

  

  Exxon Mobil Corp., Hess Corp. and Petrobras found evidence of oil at an offshore block in Brazil's Santos Basin in an area close to the largest oil discovery in three decades in the American continent.

• Wednesday, January 21st 2009 - 20:00 UTC

  Brazil “optimistic” expects a more multilateral policy

  

  Brazil trusts that the new administration of President Barack Obama will implement a more multilateral foreign policy and will strengthen political dialogue between Washington and Brasilia said Brazilian ambassador in the US Antonio Patriota.

• Tuesday, January 20th 2009 - 20:00 UTC

  Corporate cuts cost Brazil 70.000 jobs and 27.8 billion USD

  

  Brazil is estimated to have lost the equivalent of 27.8 billion US dollars in investments from domestic and international corporations as a direct consequence of the global recession, according to press reports from Sao Paulo.

• Saturday, January 17th 2009 - 20:00 UTC

  Spain's Repsol announces oil discovery offshore Brazil

  

  Spanish oil company Repsol anounced this week the discovery of “traces” of hydrocarbons at a deepwater well being drilled off the Brazilian coast. In an official statement Repsol said the well was completed in Block BM-S-48, located in the Santos Basin off the coast of the south-eastern state of Sao Paulo.

• Saturday, January 17th 2009 - 20:00 UTC

  Lula da Silva tells Obama: beware of the “government machine”

  

  Brazil's president Lula da Silva said on Friday he would like to talk with US president elect Barack Obama before the “government machine” gets hold of him and expected the incoming leader “would change his vision on Latinamerica and acknowledge the advance of regional democracy”.

• Wednesday, January 14th 2009 - 20:00 UTC

  Brazilian 2008 farm exports up 23%, total 71.9 billion

  

  Brazilian farm exports totalled a record 71.9 billion US dollars in 2008, up 23% over 2007, according to the latest reports from the Ministry of Agriculture. Farm exports also reported a surplus of 60 billion US dollars last year while agro-business represented 36.3% of all of the country's shipments.

• Wednesday, January 14th 2009 - 20:00 UTC

  Abundant rainfall “shrinks” Brazil's Bolivian gas demand

  

  Brazil will temporarily shut down power plants fired by natural gas from Bolivia and will reduce imports of the Bolivian fuel through the end of April, announced Mines and Energy mister Edison Lobao.

• Wednesday, January 14th 2009 - 20:00 UTC

  Brazil exported 620.000 bpd of crude last December

  

  Brazilian state oil company Petrobras exported in December an average of 620,000 barrels of crude per day, establishing a new record.