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Brazilian shares surged on further signs of strength in Latin America's biggest economy, while continued earnings optimism also boosted Mexican issues. Profit taking dragged Argentine stocks lower.
Brazil's Bovespa Index leapt 671.99 points, or 1.69%, while Mexico's benchmark Bolsa Index rose 206.30 points, or 1.01%, and Argentina's Merval Index fell 19.16 points, or 0.99%. Brazilian stocks advanced to a record closing high, as investors reacted to positive primary surplus and inflation data. The central bank reported that Brazil logged a primary surplus of 86.809 billion reais in the 12 months through March, equivalent to 4.39% of gross domestic product. That was above a government target of 4.25% of GDP, helping to ease concerns that the government had boosted spending ahead of the October presidential elections. Meanwhile, inflation as measured by the IPCA-15 index slowed to 0.17% in the March 15 to April 11 period, down from 0.37% in the February 11 to March 14 period, the IBGE reported. Also, the Fipe research foundation said the São Paulo consumer price index fell 0.06% in the four weeks ended April 23, matching the decline seen in the four weeks ended April 15. In corporate news, budget airline Gol Linhas Aereas Inteligentes said it received governmental authorization to operate 21 flights a week to the Chilean capital, Santiago. Yesterday, the company reported robust first- quarter earnings. Oil giant Petrobras said that its stock will be listed on the Buenos Aires Stock Exchange starting Thursday. "We expect Petrobras to become the most traded share in Buenos Aires within six months," the company said. No new Petrobras shares will be issued in Argentina. Electric energy utility Tractebel Energia SA reported a first quarter net profit of 343.8 million reais, up sharply from 172.2 million reais a year earlier. Mexican stocks posted solid gains, hitting a sixth consecutive record high, amid continued optimism about the economy and first-quarter earnings. Among today's quarterly reports, BBVA Bancomer said its first-quarter net profit jumped 84% to 4.90 billion pesos from 2.67 billion pesos a year earlier, helped strong growth in mortgage and consumer loans. Meanwhile, airport operator Grupo Aeroportuario del Sureste SA (Asur) said its first-quarter net profit tumbled 42% from a year earlier due to lower passenger traffic at its biggest airport in Cancun. Revenue fell 17%. Also reporting, home construction company Sare Holdings said its first- quarter net profit rose to 79.7 million pesos from 52.0 million pesos a year ago amid a jump in home sales. On the economic front, the Bank of Mexico estimated that first-quarter gross domestic product rose 5.2%, and predicted that the economy will grow between 3.5% and 4% for the full year. That was up from the bank's previous full-year growth forecast of 3.2% to 3.7% Argentine issues dropped, as investors took profit in some of the Merval's largest stocks, such as Tenaris and Petrobras Energia Participaciones, offsetting gains in banking and steel shares. Petrobras Energia was down ahead of its parent company's listing tomorrow on the local stock exchange. Giving steelmakers a boost, the national statistics agency said its construction index surged 16.5% in March from a year earlier. However, the index dipped a seasonally adjusted 1.1% in March from February. Thomson Financial - www.thomsonfinancial.com
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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. 
The push of vigilante groups in Rio de Janeiro's favelas (shantytowns) in the last three years is the most important and alarming information of the just-released study by the Rio de Janeiro University's Violence Research Center (Nupev-Uerj). 
A dispute over drug trafficking territory in Rio de Janeiro has intensified lately, leaving in its wake unprecedented acts of violence, such as the downing of a police helicopter in the northern zone of the city on October 17. Three policemen died and another two were injured. This event has drawn the attention of the international media, who are raising the issue of public security for the 2016 Olympics to be held in Rio.