Brazil's central bank unexpectedly left its benchmark interest rate unchanged on Wednesday, citing a more challenging and volatile situation in world economies. The bank left its benchmark Selic rate at an all-time low of 6.5%, after signaling at its previous meeting it would cut at least once more.
Brazil's first lady has jumped into a lake fully clothed to save her drowning dog. Marcela Temer was walking around the presidential palace in Brasilia with her son when the family's Jack Russell, Picoly, took an interest in the water.
While Chilean President Sebastián Piñera started a commercial tour in Brazil last Thursday, in which he avoids Uruguay because the Free Trade Agreement (FTA) with Chile is blocked in the Uruguayan Parliament since 2016, ex-president José Mujica explained that he supports the FTA with Chile in order to look for “the best incentives to ensure commercial stability.” The bench of former president Mujica and the communist party refuse to approve the commercial agreement.
China and South Korea are seeking to establish free trade agreements with Mercosur in a strategic response to Washington's increasingly protectionist stance. The East Asian initiatives have resonated well in a region where Washington is keeping its distance. U.S. President Donald Trump has not visited a single Latin American country since taking office in January 2017, and chose not to attend the Summit of the Americas, which recently concluded in Peru.
Brazil's top army commander made another foray into political commentary, warning that corruption poses a threat to democracy in Latin America's biggest country. The comment by General Eduardo Villas Boas was his second high-profile remark on the state of Brazil's democracy this month, going against an unwritten rule that high-ranking military officers keep out of politics.
Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau backed air strikes by the United States and its allies on Syria’s chemical weapons program but Argentina, Brazil and Peru voiced caution during a regional summit about the escalating military action.
Brazilian voters are abandoning jailed former President Lula da Silva as his chances of running in October fade, but they are not transferring their support en masse to other leftist candidates, a Datafolha poll showed on Sunday. Without Lula in the running, support for far-right candidate Jair Bolsonaro has slipped and is now virtually tied with environmentalist Marina Silva in a presidential race thrown wide open, the survey said.
Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau backed air strikes by the United States and its allies on Syria’s chemical weapons program but Argentina, Brazil and Peru voiced caution during a regional summit about the escalating military action.
Brazil’s President Michel Temer named Wellington Moreira Franco to take over the Mines and Energy Ministry, a key portfolio that includes overseeing the proposed privatization of Centrais Eletricas Brasileiras SA (Eletrobras).
Brazilian court has sentenced the former speaker of the country’s lower house, Eduardo Cunha to more than 15 years in prison for corruption. The ex Worker’s Party member is the highest profile political conviction yet in the ‘operation car wash’ scandal.