Economy

• Tuesday, July 19th 2011 - 06:05 UTC

  Brazil to cut ethanol content in gasoline to ease pressure on sugar market

  

  Brazil will reduce the ethanol content in gasoline in another effort to contain inflation since sugar (and ethanol) prices because of a poor crop have been soaring, according to the Sao Paulo press.

• Tuesday, July 19th 2011 - 05:59 UTC

  Argentine economic activity expands 8.1% in May; 8.9% in five months

  

  Economic activity in Argentina expanded 8.1% in May over a year ago and 8.9% in the first five months of the year according to the country’s Statistics and Census Office, Indec.

• Tuesday, July 19th 2011 - 05:12 UTC

  Paraguay wants Argentina to pay better prices for power from shared dam

  

  The presidency of the Paraguayan delegation at the Mercosur Parliament, Parlasur called on Argentina to improve the ‘reduced’ price it currently pays for surplus power from the shared hydroelectric dam of Yacyretá.

• Tuesday, July 19th 2011 - 04:49 UTC

  First aircraft lands in Bariloche over a month after the Puyehue volcano eruption

  

  Over a month after the eruption of the Caulle-Puyehue volcano in Chile, a first flight landed in the airport of Argentina’s ski resort Bariloche. The chartered flight arrived from Sao Paulo with 120 Brazilian tourists.

• Tuesday, July 19th 2011 - 01:15 UTC

  Brazil tightens consumer credit backed by wages and pensions

  

  Brazil's central bank on Monday tightened rules on credit card loans backed by wages and pensions which households are increasingly using as a source of long-term borrowing.

• Monday, July 18th 2011 - 10:22 UTC

  US congress closer to deal on debt-ceiling but with Obama paying the political cost

  

  United States government and opposition senators are crafting a plan that could avert an unprecedented US government default if by next 2 August the national debt limit is not raised.

• Saturday, July 16th 2011 - 07:08 UTC

  Chilean central bank leaves benchmark rate unchanged at 5.25%

  

  The Chilean central bank kept its benchmark interest rate unchanged this week for the first time since January as signs of slower growth abroad and a moderation in domestic output and demand provided space to delay additional increases.

• Saturday, July 16th 2011 - 06:58 UTC

  Eight out of 90 banks in Europe fail stress-test, five of them from Spain

  

  Eight banks have failed Europe's bank stress test designed to assess whether they can weather another economic crisis while 16 banks barely passed, bank regulators said on Friday.

• Friday, July 15th 2011 - 16:33 UTC

  US June consumer prices fell 0.2%, but growing fears of core inflation

  

  The cost of living in the United States fell in June, as a sharp drop in energy cost offset other price rises. Consumer prices fell 0.2%, their first monthly fall in a year; excluding energy and food, prices rose slightly. The annual inflation rate was 3.6%.

• Friday, July 15th 2011 - 16:31 UTC

  Plan to support Brazilian industry from foreign protectionism to be announced August 2

  

  Brazil’s president Dilma Rousseff announced Thursday night the launching of a new plan aimed to boost and protect Brazilian industry against international competition and at the same called for a technological development leap forward.