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Latin American stocks posted modest gains, with Brazilian shares getting a boost from tame inflation data and news of a potential stock split at minining firm Companhia Vale do Rio Doce (CVRD).
Meanwhile, upbeat GDP data and reassuring comments from the Bank of Mexico buoyed Mexican issues. Argentina's market was closed. Brazil's Bovespa Index added 103.20 points, or 0.28%, while Mexico's benchmark Bolsa Index rose 83.43 points, or 0.43%. Brazilian stocks edged cautiously higher, as buyers nibbled on recently beaten down shares, amid continued concerns about rising U.S. interest rates ahead of next week's Federal Reserve meeting. Investors are anxiously awaiting the Fed's statement that will accompany its anticipated rate hike on Tuesday for any indication of how much longer the current U.S. monetary tightening cycle will last. In local economic news, Brazil's inflation as measured by the IPCA-15 index decelerated to 0.37% in the February 11 to March 14 period, from 0.52% in the January 14 to February 10 period, IBGE said. Also, Brazil's Central Bank said it expects the country's inflation rate to end 2006 and 2007 close to the goal of 4.5%. "It is expected that inflation will be very close to the goal of 4.5% for 2006 and 2007," the bank said. In corporate news, investors reacted positively to reports that mining giant Companhia Vale do Rio Doce's board of directors approved a 2-for-1 stock split proposal aimed at maintaining the liquidity of its shares. CVRD said the proposal still has to be approved at a meeting of shareholders. Meanwhile, Standard & Poor's Rating Services said it raised its foreign and local currency corporate credit ratings on media group Globo Comunicação e Participações S.A. (Globo) to 'BB-' from 'B+'. The outlook on the ratings is stable. "The rating action was prompted by the significant improvement of Globo's financial risk profile since the conclusion of its debt restructuring in mid-2005," S&P said. In other corporate news, a major investment bank downgraded wireless provider Telemig Celular Participações SA to "underweight" from "equalweight," citing a deterioration in margins in the company's fourth-quarter results. Mexican shares recouped some of the previous day's losses, which stemmed from profit-taking following a recent rally in the IPC index. In economic headlines, as expected, the Bank of Mexico eased monetary policy for the eighth time in so many months. The central bank reduced rates by 25 basis points to 7.25% and said it expects inflation to continue its recent downward trend. Elsewhere, the National Statistics Institute, or Inegi, said that the economy grew 5.7% in January from a year ago, thanks to gains in industrial and agricultural production and services. The global indicator of economic activity, or IGAE, advanced 1.96% from December on a seasonally-adjusted basis. In corporate news, local news reports said that a group of 45 senators will support a new radio and television law that should benefit Televisa. The bill has been criticized as being overly favorable for Televisa, Mexico's leading broadcaster. Thomson Financial Corporate Group - www.thomsonfinancial.com
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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.