Happy Friday! Today, how a strike at the Central Bank is affecting markets. The financial toll of natural disasters in Brazil. And a disinformation network out of the barracks.
Strike at the Central Bank disorients markets
Brazil’s official statistics agency will publish the IPCA consumer price index for March today. Markets expect inflation to have accelerated from 1.01 percent in February to somewhere around 1.33 percent last month, according to multiple banks and investment houses. That would take the 12-month inflation rate to 11 percent.
Interest. The inflation data will present a challenge for the Central Bank, which will hold its next Monetary Policy Committee meeting on May 3-4, where it will set the benchmark interest rate for the country.
- But the bank – as well as the entire market – is being deprived of key economic indicators as their disclosure has been compromised by a workers’ strike that is moving into its seventh day today.
Blackout. While essential services within the bank have continued operating, disclosures of currency flows, credit and fiscal data, default rates, open market data, and the trade balance were not published this week. The Focus Report, a weekly survey of top-rated investment firms to measure...