Argentina and Brazil postponed the signing of a 1.8 billion US dollars swap agreement that was supposed to promote bilateral trade amid the global financial crisis. Reasons for the delay were not revealed but the event was rescheduled for August 3.
A third of European workers are very concerned that they could lose their jobs as result of the financial crisis, an EU survey suggests. EU said six in 10 Europeans felt the worst of the economic crisis was to come, and only 28% said it had passed.
Hopes of a swift end to the United Kingdom recession were shaken after figures showed a far worse than expected decline of 0.8% in the economy between April and June. The UK's fifth successive quarter of recession was much deeper than the 0.3% forecast, stunning experts and business leaders.
Mercosur will conclude this year with positive rates of economic activity in spite of the global crisis, although some members such as Paraguay might not be able to contain the downfall and will end in red numbers.
Brazil's antitrust regulator imposed a record fine of 352 million Reais (approximately 176 million US dollars) Wednesday on beverage giant AmBev. The Cade regulator found that AmBev, brewer of Skol, Brahma and Antarctica beers, used discounts, premiums and exclusivity agreements to dissuade retailers from selling competing brands.
The United States unit of the world's largest meat processor, Brazilian JBS SA, filed for an initial public offering of up to 2 billion US dollars on Wednesday, making it the largest planned offering in the US IPO pipeline.
Brazil’s Central bank lowered on Wednesday the benchmark Selic rate by a half point to a record low 8.75%. The bank had cut the rate by at least a full point at all four previous policy meetings of 2009.
Mercosur presidents will consider this week during the summit in Paraguay, the possibility of using local currencies to finance inter-region trade, revealed the host country’s president Fernando Lugo.
Argentina's Economy ministry will have increased control over the national statistics and census agency, Indec, announced on Tuesday the government in a bid to restore credibility to the country's consumer price data.
In anticipation of his Semiannual Monetary Policy Report to the United States Congress on July 21st, Federal Reserve Chairman Ben S. Bernanke wrote a column which basically is a synthesis of his presentation before the Committee on Financial Services from the US House of Representatives.