Brasília – The Brazilian Central Bank (BC, in the Portuguese acronym) has lowered the projection for Brazil’s economic growth this year. As per the Quarterly Inflation Report, disclosed this Monday (29th), the Brazilian Gross Domestic Product (GDP), i.e. the sum of all goods and services produced in the country, should increase by 0.7%, as against 1.6% in the previous projection.
According to the BC, the agricultural output should increase by 2.3% – previous estimate was 2.8%. Industrial output should decline by 1.6%, while previous estimate saw a 0.4% contraction. Service sector growth estimate dropped from 2% to 1.2%. The projections for exports and imports were revised from 2.3% to 3.6%, and from 0.6% to 1%, respectively.
The Focus Bulletin, which is a weekly poll of financial institutions, was also disclosed. The GDP projection for 2014 has been notched down from 0.30% to 0.29%. As regards dollar price, the new exchange rate estimate, by the end of the year, is R$ 2.35 and benchmark interest rate (aka Selic) estimate has been kept at 11% per annum. As regards the foreign sector, the expected current account deficit is US$ 81.20 billion, while trade balance surplus is expected to run at US$ 2.40 billion and foreign direct investments to amount to US$ 60 billion.
*Translated by Rodrigo Mendonça
