Growing Rumors of Finance Minister's Resignation Leave Brazil Singing the Blues
Written by Paul Davee
Monday, 14 November 2005
Latin American stocks were mixed, with Brazilian stocks slumping amid news reports that the country's Finance Minister will soon resign. Meanwhile, Mexican shares gained ground amid positive analyst commentary.
Brazil's Bovespa Index dropped 292.01 points, or 0.96%. Mexico's benchmark Bolsa Index rose 156.46 points, or 0.97%, while Argentina's Merval Index added 2.43 points, or 0.15%.
Brazilian stocks dropped amid heightened concerns about a widening political scandal after several Brazilian newspapers reported that Finance Minister Antonio Palocci will soon resign over corruption allegations and criticism of his orthodox economic policies.
Some of the reports said the administration of Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva is searching for a replacement for Palocci, while other papers said Lula is preparing a speech to defend Palocci's policies.
Last week, Brazil's Chief of Staff Dilma Roussef criticized Palocci's economic policy and said Brazil would not raise the country's primary surplus target as aides of Palocci have suggested. However, Brazilian Trade Minister Luiz Fernando Furlan said he thinks Palocci "won't leave" his post.
In corporate news, Banco do Brasil reported a bigger-than-expected net profit of 1.438 billion reais for the third quarter, up 72.7% from 833 million reais a year earlier.
Shares of power utility Light rose following press reports that an investment fund to be created by construction firm Andrade Gutierrez may purchase the company from France's EDF.
Petrobras was active after the oil giant said it expects to produce more than 100,000 barrels of oil a day from two Nigerian fields, and that it won't need to issue new debt in 2006 thanks to better-than-expected cash generation this year.
Meatpacker Perdigão S.A. said late Friday that its third-quarter profit more than doubled to 96.6 million reais from 40.3 million a year ago.
Aircraft maker Embraer said late Friday that its third-quarter net profit tumbled to 89.3 million reais from 396.9 million reais last year, missing analyst forecasts of 257 million reais. The company added that the real's strength will hurt profit margins in the fourth quarter just as it did in the third quarter.
Elsewhere, Mexican shares climbed to another record high. Lending support, an influential investment bank said it remains cautiously optimistic on Mexican equities. "Investors will likely focus on earnings and keep their positions as long as the companies continue to deliver," the bank said, adding that it favors America Movil's stock as well as shares of retailers, wireless, media and homebuilders.
In other developments, Bank of Mexico Governor Guillermo Ortiz said he still expects inflation to rebound around the end of the year. He reiterated the central bank's year-end forecast of 3.5% annual inflation.
Meanwhile, Argentine issues edged up amid a dearth of fresh market news, as the earnings season drew to a close last week.
Helping to buoy the Merval, a consumer confidence index released by Torcuato di Tella University rose 6.5% in November from October, marking the largest monthly gain since January. Thomson Financial Corporate Group – www.thomsonfinancial.com
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.