Bargain Hunters Descend Upon Brazil and Stocks Jump Up
Written by Linda Shea
Friday, 21 October 2005
Brazil and Latin America greatly improved Friday, October 21, as bargain hunters moved in. A rash of upbeat corporate reports also bolstered Brazil and Mexico. In the U.S., investors weighed a disappointing earnings release and outlook from Dow member Caterpillar with strong results from Google.
Brazil's Bovespa Index rallied 831.71 points, or 2.93%. Mexico's benchmark Bolsa Index jumped 82.26 points, or 0.56%, while Argentina's Merval Index surged 20.42 points, or 1.30%.
Brazilian shares strongly recovered from yesterday's deluge of losses. Bargain hunters were active, and investors ignored an economic indicator pointing toward higher inflation.
The Brazilian Census Bureau announced that the IPCA-15 rose 0.56% in the September 13 to October 11 period, up from 0.16% in the August 12 to September 12 period. The most recent advance was due to rising fuel prices.
In earnings reports, Brazilian phone firm Brasil Telecom posted a third-quarter net loss of 25.1 million reais, reversing a year-earlier net profit of 85.2 million reais in the corresponding period a year earlier. The most recent result was beneath the average analyst target. Still, net revenues climbed to 2.58 billion reais from 2.36 billion reais.
Meanwhile, paper and pulp producers suffered from the real's appreciation against the greenback in the third quarter. Suzano's quarterly profit fell to 153.2 million reais from 262.6 million reais last year. Revenues climbed to 756.3 million from 707.4 million reais.
Separately, Klabin said that its third-quarter net profit tumbled 52% to 64.7 million reais from 135.1 million reais a year ago. Net revenues fell to 650 million reais from 738 million reais, while EBITDA receded to 154 million reais from 282 million reais.
Elsewhere, state-controlled oil firm Petrobras said that it is considering reviving plans to construct a 5 billion reais pipeline to transport crude from the Campos Basin to Sao Paulo state refineries, according to news reports.
Also, the U.S. Department of Commerce eliminated an antidumping tariff brought against hot-rolled coils produced by CSN Steel.
Mexican stocks also shared in today's regional recovery, thanks to a mix of bargain hunting and upbeat earnings and economic news. Also, Grupo Carso's building unit Cicsa was active on its first day of trade.
On the economic front, the National Statistics Institute said that retail sales jumped 5.6% in August from a year ago, and climbed 0.63% from July on a seasonally adjusted basis.
Cement titan Cemex said that its third-quarter net profit nearly doubled to US$ 675 million from US$ 361 million a year ago. The most recent result was bolstered by higher sales from acquisitions and financial gains from its derivatives positions. Sales more than doubled to US$ 4.3 billion, while operating profit leapt 56% to US$ 771 million.
Argentina finally reversed three-straight session declines and turned positive ahead of this Sunday's congressional elections. First Lady Cristina Kirchner is running for a Senate seat in Buenos Aires province, which could strengthen President Kirchner's mandate.
Brazil received a huge boost in its international image with its selection as the host of the 2016 Olympics, but it was really just the cherry on top of the overall recognition of the country's ascension to the ranks of one of the world's most important countries. Now, as it finally takes its place on the world scene, there has been a great deal of concern about what kind of image Brazil hopes to project, now that the world is really paying attention.
The only good thing to say about the visit to Brazil of Iran's president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, on Monday November 23, is that it was mercifully short and lasted less than 24 hours. Ahmadinejad had his picture taken being hugged by president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva who gave him a warm welcome and said Iran had every right to develop nuclear energy for peaceful purposes.
The small, coastal town of Condé is located just a twenty minute's drive from João Pessoa, the capital of Paraíba. The Northeast of Brazil has historically been a place of encounter and mixing between peoples. For millenia groups of indigenous people fished, farmed, migrated and sometimes fought along this large, fertile area.
The Brazilian diplo-MÁ-cia (bad diplomacy) carries on its accelerated course towards the non-acknowledgment of human rights, although sometimes it takes pleasure in saying that it does precisely the opposite. The visit of Iran's president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, is another example of a diplomatic omission that verges on hypocrisy.
On July 4, 2006, representatives of Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay and Uruguay met in Caracas to sign the protocol for the entrance of Venezuela into the Southern Common Market (Mercosur). After two and a half years, the protocol was approved by the legislative bodies of Argentina and Uruguay, and as of now it may be only days away from being ratified by the continent's economic megalith, Brazil.
Some sectors of the fight against AIDS have suggested that Thabo Mbeki, the former president of South Africa, committed genocide through his absence from the fight against the illness in his country throughout his two terms.
One hundred and eleven years after Brazil abolished slavery, the number of workers deprived of their freedom is still huge. They raise cattle, produce charcoal, sugar cane or timber. Some of them, most undocumented Bolivians, work in basements of small apparel factories in São Paulo and other metropolis.
On November 7, 2009 a few friends and I had an opportunity to take a look inside a Brazilian jail outside the city of Rio de Janeiro. We were able to take some amateur footage of our experience on video (see link below). It's no surprise, of course, that the typical Brazilian jail lacks some of the functionality of those in North America or Europe, but our experience that day was quite shocking.
Depletion of the Amazon Rainforest is not a new concern facing environmentalists, biologists, ecologists, and a growing number of the Amazonian indigenous peoples. For decades they have feared for the fate of the world's most biologically diverse and species-rich hothouse.
Geisy Arruda made history this week in Brazil, but for all the wrong reasons. What began as a poorly planned fashion statement has become a worldwide tale. Geisy decided to wear a pink mini-dress to her private college in São Paulo state, and after that, all hell broke loose.
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Brazil received a huge boost in its international image with its selection as the host of the 2016 Olympics, but it was really just the cherry on top of the overall recognition of the country's ascension to the ranks of one of the world's most important countries. Now, as it finally takes its place on the world scene, there has been a great deal of concern about what kind of image Brazil hopes to project, now that the world is really paying attention. 
The only good thing to say about the visit to Brazil of Iran's president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, on Monday November 23, is that it was mercifully short and lasted less than 24 hours. Ahmadinejad had his picture taken being hugged by president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva who gave him a warm welcome and said Iran had every right to develop nuclear energy for peaceful purposes. 
The small, coastal town of Condé is located just a twenty minute's drive from João Pessoa, the capital of Paraíba. The Northeast of Brazil has historically been a place of encounter and mixing between peoples. For millenia groups of indigenous people fished, farmed, migrated and sometimes fought along this large, fertile area. 
The Brazilian diplo-MÁ-cia (bad diplomacy) carries on its accelerated course towards the non-acknowledgment of human rights, although sometimes it takes pleasure in saying that it does precisely the opposite. The visit of Iran's president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, is another example of a diplomatic omission that verges on hypocrisy. 
On July 4, 2006, representatives of Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay and Uruguay met in Caracas to sign the protocol for the entrance of Venezuela into the Southern Common Market (Mercosur). After two and a half years, the protocol was approved by the legislative bodies of Argentina and Uruguay, and as of now it may be only days away from being ratified by the continent's economic megalith, Brazil. 
Some sectors of the fight against AIDS have suggested that Thabo Mbeki, the former president of South Africa, committed genocide through his absence from the fight against the illness in his country throughout his two terms. 
One hundred and eleven years after Brazil abolished slavery, the number of workers deprived of their freedom is still huge. They raise cattle, produce charcoal, sugar cane or timber. Some of them, most undocumented Bolivians, work in basements of small apparel factories in São Paulo and other metropolis. 
On November 7, 2009 a few friends and I had an opportunity to take a look inside a Brazilian jail outside the city of Rio de Janeiro. We were able to take some amateur footage of our experience on video (see link below). It's no surprise, of course, that the typical Brazilian jail lacks some of the functionality of those in North America or Europe, but our experience that day was quite shocking. 
Depletion of the Amazon Rainforest is not a new concern facing environmentalists, biologists, ecologists, and a growing number of the Amazonian indigenous peoples. For decades they have feared for the fate of the world's most biologically diverse and species-rich hothouse. 
Geisy Arruda made history this week in Brazil, but for all the wrong reasons. What began as a poorly planned fashion statement has become a worldwide tale. Geisy decided to wear a pink mini-dress to her private college in São Paulo state, and after that, all hell broke loose.