Absolut Brazil http://www.absolutbrazil.info Up-to-date information on Brazil on Economy & Businesses, Real Estate & Investing, Tourism and Travelling and more. Mon, 22 Feb 2010 23:40:17 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.7.1 en hourly 1 News - Carrefour CEO sees Brazil sales surging-report http://www.absolutbrazil.info/carrefour-sees-brazil-sales-surging/ http://www.absolutbrazil.info/carrefour-sees-brazil-sales-surging/#comments Mon, 22 Feb 2010 23:38:59 +0000 NS http://www.absolutbrazil.info/?p=1172 News - Carrefour CEO sees Brazil sales surging-report

SAO PAULO, Feb 22 (Reuters) - Carrefour (CARR.PA), the world’s No. 2 retailer, expects sales in Brazil to surge in the next five years because of expansion in Latin America’s largest economy and buoyant consumer demand, newspaper O Estado de S. Paulo said on Monday.

Brazil should account for 20 percent of Carrefour’s global sales in five years, up from 10 percent, Chief Executive Lars Olofsson told Estado in an interview. Though the retailer will focus on short-term sales growth in France, Italy, Spain and Belgium, the biggest opportunities in the medium and long term are in Brazil and China, Olofsson added.

Carrefour may implement the same model used in its Brazilian wholesale chain Atacadao in hypermarkets in France in a bid to boost sales, Estado said, citing Olofsson. The company is expanding the Atacadao chain to Colombia and is studying to bring it to Argentina also, he said.

Brazil has an enormous consumer market, the economy is growing and the country’s retail segment becoming more modern, giving the country “central importance for the future of Carrefour,” Olofsson said in the Estado interview.

The company has no plans to sell its Brazil business, Olofsson said, declining to comment on a supposed offer by U.S. retail giant Wal-Mart Stores Inc (WMT.N) last year for the business.

Source: Reuters.

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]]> http://www.absolutbrazil.info/carrefour-sees-brazil-sales-surging/feed/ Article - Spot Luck: Great wildlife encounters in Brazil http://www.absolutbrazil.info/great-wildlife-encounters-in-brazil/ http://www.absolutbrazil.info/great-wildlife-encounters-in-brazil/#comments Sun, 21 Feb 2010 20:42:00 +0000 NS http://www.absolutbrazil.info/?p=1168 Article - Spot Luck: Great wildlife encounters in Brazil

From the Amazon jungle to the wetlands of the Pantanal, Brazil is home to an astonishing diversity of plant and animal life

It’s a nose. A very long nose. It swings back and forth in our direction, combing the breeze for our scent like some animated Hoover nozzle. Finding nothing amiss, the owner continues her meandering path towards us. What now?

The long grass parts as her outlandish form emerges into full view. Fifteen metres, 10 metres, eight metres. Surely she has seen us. But the wind is in our favour and those stuck-on currants of eyes are fooling nobody. Now we can see her pickaxe front claws and metre-long witch’s broom of a tail. And, best of all, her passenger: a mini-me clinging gamely to mum’s back like some myopic clanger.

Six metres, four metres. We shift nervously. She stops. The wind changes. And she’s off, turning tail and shuffling away down the hillside, that strange marking around her shoulders now a trailing scarf.

We breathe again. Giant anteater. The fourth of South America’s Big Five – and definitely the weirdest yet. Grins all round: just one to go.

I’m not sold on this “Big Five” business, I admit. The term hails from colonial Africa, where the quintet in question (lion, leopard, elephant, rhino and buffalo), were supposedly the hunter’s most dangerous adversaries and so topped his tick-list for trophies. Today it is really just a strap-line for the safari industry, and is roundly condemned in some quarters by conservationists. In any case, it is inappropriate in South America, where wildlife watching has traditionally involved a more general immersion in the continent’s dizzying menagerie. Why not the Oddball Eight, say, or the Thrilling 37?

Yet inevitably, perhaps, five South American mammals have been saddled with “bigness”: namely jaguar, tapir, maned wolf, giant anteater and giant river otter. Brazil, conveniently, is home to all five. Thus tracking them down seems as good a premise as any for charting a course around this immense country.

But back to where we started, our first stop: the Amazon. If ever there was a Big Five of habitats then this would surely top the list: there are more species of beetle here than there are life forms in the whole of Europe. It’s also home to four of the Big Five. But finding these beasts in the world’s biggest jungle is notoriously tricky. Admittedly we don’t comb the whole 5.5 million square kilometres but opt, instead, for a few days at Cristalino Jungle Lodge.

This discreet forest hideaway, accessible only by river, is tucked into the heart of an estate the size of Greater London on the very southern fringe of the forest. In Amazonian terms it’s a postage stamp. Yet it’s stuffed with wildlife and as good a place as any to start.

And so we hit the trail. Each morning our guide Marcos leads us deep into the forest. We duck lianas, clamber over buttress roots and skirt columns of army ants, all the time peering up for movement in the canopy. It’s hard work: an occasional crash or squawk betrays monkeys or macaws high above, but the green curtain gives little away.

At ground level, however, it’s another story. Marcos points out exquisite bromeliads, electric blue morpho butterflies and the delicate clay funnels of cicada larvae. We gather around the trunk of a statuesque Brazil nut tree, where he retrieves a cricket ball-sized nut from the leaf litter. One swing of a machete reveals the seeds – the “nuts” we know from Christmas hampers – arranged like orange segments. They taste sweet and oily, like coconut.

There is no shortage of other giants: a fist-sized elephant beetle lumbers across the lodge terrace; a saucer-sized tarantula waves hairy pedipalps from its silk-lined burrow; and sheep-sized capybaras – at 50kg, the world’s largest rodent – emerge from the river each night to graze the lodge lawns. We even come close to seeing the world’s largest snake when we nervously investigate a fetid swamp where a monster anaconda has recently been spotted. I’m sure it sees us.

Then there are the birds: Cristalino’s tally of more than 570 species is exceptional even by Amazon standards. And to make spotting them easier the lodge has built the world’s highest canopy tower. Up here, swaying a nerve-jangling 52m above the forest floor, we watch scarlet macaws, channel-billed toucans and swallow-tailed kites commuting over the undulating treescape, while screaming pihas add their hidden shrieks to the chorus below.

The river offers another perspective still. Each crescent sandbank erupts in butterfly confetti as our boat sweeps by. Far upstream we cut the engine and drift silently into a placid backwater. All is still but for the dancing light on the water – and an odd wheezing sound among the overhanging creepers. Paddling closer brings a crashing and flapping, followed by several large, prehistoric-looking birds lurching out across the water. These are hoatzins. They digest food in their throat and produce nestlings with claws on their wings. Not Big Five fodder, maybe, but another A-lister among Brazil’s weird and wonderful.

The next day finds us 700km further south, bumping along a straight dirt road through a mosaic of grassland and swamp. Pink piuva trees and red termite mounds punctuate the flatness, while egrets and storks festoon the ditches.

This is the Pantanal – a vast wetland that western Brazil shares with Paraguay and Bolivia, and a world away from Cristalino’s Amazonian tangle. Its open terrain and highly visible wildlife offer something more akin to an African safari. What’s more, it’s Big Five country. This is good news, as we are still not even on the score sheet.

Our road is the Transpantaneira Highway, originally built to cross the entire Pantanal (which is bigger than England) from north to south but grinding to a halt in 1976 on the banks of the Cuiaba River – about halfway down. You can understand why: 136 wooden bridges already knit together its 146km length. This is not the easiest place to build a road.

Today these bridges are a boon for wildlife watchers. We pull over on the rickety planks to watch capybara and marsh deer nibbling the greenery and countless yacaré caiman – the local crocodiles – cruising the waterways. Birds are everywhere: scarcely a fence post is without its heron or kingfisher.

Fence posts, it turns out, are integral to the character of the Pantanal, as this wildlife paradise is also cattle country. The tourist fazendas located at regular intervals along the road are working ranches that have diversified in search of the tourist dollar.

Our guide, Eduardo Falcao, is from local ranching stock himself and at each overnight stop friends or relatives emerge to greet him. These fazendas combine the charms of a traditional ranch with the tourist comforts of swimming pool and breakfast buffet. What’s more, their grounds teem with wildlife, from the capybaras that wander the terrace to the hyacinth macaws – the world’s biggest, and surely noisiest, parrot – cackling across the front lawns. Look away and you lose your breakfast to a cardinal, a cowbird or a kiskadee.

At the Pousada Rio Claro a cattle drive is passing through. Dust hangs over the beasts massing on the riverbank, and from behind a tree we watch the cowboys – and one cowgirl – urge the animals forward, their horses rearing among the mêleé. Horns toss and nostrils flare as 400 white brahmins thunder into the river; a heifer that strikes out for freedom is immediately lassoed and hauled back into the throng. Eduardo tells us how 12 drowned at this crossing last year. But today all emerge on the far bank, adorned with dripping trophies of water hyacinth.

It’s an impressive sight. But we didn’t come here for cows. The next few days see us combing the Pantanal’s byways for its celebrated wildlife. Along forest trails we meet sleepy howler monkeys and inquisitive capuchins. From wooden viewing platforms we spot massive-hootered toco toucans and shy red brocket deer. And by night, Eduardo’s spotlight picks out burrowing owls, crab-eating raccoons and even a shy ocelot mousing in a field.

Seeing the ocelot reminds us that a much larger spotted cat also prowls these parts. It’s now 10 days into the trip, after all, and our Big Five list remains obstinately unticked. No problem, explains Eduardo, as we rumble on down the Transpantaneira. We’re heading for jaguar country.

It is the jaguar that has planted the Pantanal on the tourist map. Sightings have become increasingly reliable here – helped by a recent let-up in persecution from ranchers who, understandably, have long resented the big cat’s taste for cattle. Lucky visitors today might meet a jaguar almost anywhere – even swaggering down the Transpantaneira. But the Cuiaba River area is widely acknowledged to be Jaguar Central. With four nights booked at the Porto Jofre Hotel, a fishing lodge on its banks, our fingers are crossed.

Each day sees us out early in Eduardo’s boat. There’s an African Queen-style thrill to cruising between the jungled banks up the main channel. But the excitement – and wildlife – intensifies in the backwaters, where Eduardo cuts the engine to negotiate the weed-choked shallows by paddle. Sunbitterns pick warily along the shore, iguanas bask on overhanging branches and caimans are everywhere, their toothy snouts poking through the water hyacinth.

It is down one such channel that, on the first morning, a splash interrupts our meanderings. “Giant river otters,” shouts Eduardo and swings the boat around. A head pops up, then another – and another. The animals eye us fearlessly, revealing whiskered muzzles, white bibs and ferocious canines. The world’s largest otters, they can reach nearly two metres in length and are serious predators. Lobos del rio is the Spanish name: “river wolves”.

For 20 minutes the otters – there are six in total – cavort around us, keeping up a refrain of chirrups, grunts and whistles. Our cameras can’t keep pace as they bob up then roll under: one moment almost touchable, the next chomping on a fish 100 metres away. We’re delighted: not only by the entertainment and rarity value, but also because they’re the first of our Big Five.

The second comes unexpectedly as we are chugging back to camp in the midday heat. Four twitching ears turn out to be two Brazilian tapirs cooling off in the shallows. As we approach, their big, pig-like forms emerge from the water and walk up the bank on V C surprisingly delicate legs. The forest soon swallows them up – but not before we’ve clocked the stiff manes and mini-trunks that characterise South America’s largest mammal.

Only one animal packs enough punch to consider a tapir fair game and we finally find the third member of our Big Five dozing on a riverbank. I catch my breath as the dappled shadows resolve through binoculars into the painted contours of a jaguar. He’s a big male: all massive head and muscled shoulders, like a leopard on steroids. We cut the engine and drift closer. He seems untroubled by our presence – there’s just a mildly irritated shift and twitch. But I feel a primal frisson when those implacable amber eyes bore into mine.

Eduardo remembers as a child hunting jaguars with his father. Today he’s a conservation convert, and sets out to educate locals. “Always I tell Pantaneiros if they have one jaguar on their land to leave it alone,” he explains. “If they kill it then others will come and eat their cattle.” Besides, experience has shown Eduardo how tourism can trump ranching. “Binoculars,” he grins, brandishing his own rather pricy pair, “are better than cowboys.”

The sun is sinking by the time we turn towards camp. Eduardo swings into the current as the first fishing bats swoop and swerve across our bows. Behind us the river is dark and wild. South America’s most powerful predator is surely safe here for a while yet.

Three down, two to go. But our prospects of completing the set are not looking good as our minibus crawls uphill into a pea-souper. We can hardly see the verge, let alone any passing wildlife.

It’s two days later and we’ve left the Pantanal 1,000km to our west. This is now the Serra da Canastra National Park, perched on a plateau in Minas Gerais Province, where the Sao Francisco River is born as a trickling brook. Our guide, Regina Rebeiro, has explained how this rugged terrain is home to many specialised animals. How its high, rolling grasslands offer fabulous vistas over the surrounding plain. She never mentioned the mist.

I’m beginning to think we should give this up as a bad job. Return, perhaps, to our hotel in the quirky village of Sao Roque, whose residents must surely have developed Brazil’s strongest thighs simply in order to walk the precipitously sloping cobbled streets.

But Regina’s patience is rewarded as the mist begins to lift, and we soon spot the unmistakable outline of a giant anteater working a distant hillside. Number four in the bag. The park is thought to hold the world’s densest population of this bizarre beast and we find half a dozen over the course of an hour – culminating in that memorable mother-and-baby close-up.

Just one left. And with the views now as panoramic as promised, we don’t have long to wait. Regina spies something fox-red moving along the valley floor. Binoculars confirm that this is indeed a fox – but one apparently on stilts, and with a distinctly equine mane and tail. A maned wolf. We scramble from the vehicle just in time to see the strange, elegant animal disappear into the long grass. This animal – technically not a wolf but the world’s tallest fox – is extremely rare. What’s more, it’s number five on our list. We’ve got the set.

And so, it seems, a well-planned search – with a little bit of luck thrown in – can bag you South America’s Big Five in a single trip to Brazil. But ours would have been a memorable wildlife trip even had none of the holy quinity deigned to show up. Whatever your agenda, if it’s simply a ruse to explore Brazil’s extraordinary wildlife riches, you won’t be disappointed.

Brazil’s Big Five

* Giant anteater

The world’s largest species of anteater is classified as “vulnerable” by the International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources (IUCN). Males can grow to 7ft long, including 3ft of tail. Its main predators are jaguars and cougars which the anteater can fight or even kill by standing on its hind legs and using its claws. Its main habitat is the rainforest and grasslands of Central and South America. It can eat up to 30,000 ants or termites in a day.

* Giant river otter

The largest member of the mustelid (weasel) family is classed as “endangered” by the IUCN. Males can grow to be over 6ft long. The otters are often hunted for their pelt. They also face dangers from the loss of freshwater habitat in north-central South America.

* Jaguar

Classified as “near threatened” by the IUCN, the jaguar is the world’s third largest feline after the tiger and lion. It can be found from Mexico to Paraguay. Males can grow to 8ft long including a 2ft tail. The jaguar mainly hunts large mammals such as deer, and sometimes cattle, using its strength to haul its prey into trees out of danger. Unusually for a cat, it is at home in the water.

* Tapir

The Brazilian Tapir – a herbivore found near water in the Amazon rainforest and river basin – is the largest wild land animal in South America and is classified as “vulnerable” by the IUCN. Males can grow to be over 8ft long. Their main predators are jaguars. They are deceptively quick on land, and are excellent swimmers and divers.

* Maned wolf

The maned wolf is in fact a large fox and the largest canine in South America. It is classified by the IUCN as “near threatened”. Mainly found in southern Brazil and northern Argentina it is unusual among its type as it does not form packs, instead hunting alone. It can be up to 1m tall and has been called a “red fox on stilts”.

By Peter Harmer

Travel essentials: Brazil

Getting there

* British Airways (0844 493 0787; britishairways.com ) and TAM Airlines (020-8897 0005;tamairlines.com ) fly direct from Heathrow to Sao Paulo. TAM offers multi-trip air passes to Alta Floresta (Cristalino), Cuiaba (northern Pantanal) and Belo Horizonte (Serra da Canastra).

* Similar tours, including transport, activities and guide, are available from Wildlife Trails (0844 686 5532; wildlifetrails.co.uk ) and other leading wildlife tour companies. Independent travellers can explore the northern Pantanal and Serra da Canastra using self-drive, but access to Cristalino is by the lodge’s boat only.

* Regina Rebeiro (rejaguar@bol.com.br) is an English-speaking guide who organises wildlife tours in Brazil and South America.

Staying there

* Cristalino Jungle Lodge, Alta Floresta, Mato Grosso (00 55 66 3521 1396;cristalinolodge.com.br ). Doubles start at US$340 (£227), full board with transfers from Alta Floresta and activities.

* Pousada Araras Eco Lodge, near Cuiaba, Pantanal, Mato Grosso (00 55 65 3682 2800;araraslodge.com.br ). Doubles start at US$572 (£381), full board with activities.

* Jaguar Ecological Reserve, Km110 Transpantaneira, Pantanal, Mato Grosso (00 55 65 3646 9679; jaguarreserve.com ). Doubles start at US$500 (£334), full board inc activities.

* Hotel Porto Jofre, Av Sao Sebastiao 357, Cidade Alta, Cuiaba, Mato Grosso (00 55 65 3637 1593; portojofre.com.br ).

* Hotel Chapadão Canastra, Sao Roque de Minas, Minas Gerais (00 55 37 3433 1267;canastra.com.br/hospedagem/chapadao ). Doubles start at £14, incl breakfast.

More information

Brazilian Tourist Office: 020-7396 5551; braziltour.com

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]]> http://www.absolutbrazil.info/great-wildlife-encounters-in-brazil/feed/ News - Buy Brazil’s Real Versus Australian Dollar, Morgan Stanley Says http://www.absolutbrazil.info/news-buy-brazil%e2%80%99s-real-versus-australian-dollar/ http://www.absolutbrazil.info/news-buy-brazil%e2%80%99s-real-versus-australian-dollar/#comments Thu, 18 Feb 2010 20:06:27 +0000 NS http://www.absolutbrazil.info/?p=1165 News - Buy Brazil’s Real Versus Australian Dollar, Morgan Stanley Says

Feb. 17 (Bloomberg) — Investors should buy the real against the Australian dollar, citing the 5 percent decline in the Brazilian currency this year against the Aussie as “too sharp, too fast,” Morgan Stanley said.

“We see value in the Brazilian real at current levels,” Vitali Meschoulam, a New York-based emerging-market strategist, wrote in a research note to clients today. “The Brazilian real’s sell-off was perhaps too sharp, too fast, and is potentially out of line with the large inflows expected for the next several years that will be necessary to finance infrastructure developments.”

Investors should buy the real versus the Australian dollar through 12-month non-deliverable forwards, according to the note.

Source: BusinessWeek.

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]]> http://www.absolutbrazil.info/news-buy-brazil%e2%80%99s-real-versus-australian-dollar/feed/ News - Brazil Demand Pushes Job Creation to January Record http://www.absolutbrazil.info/brazil-demand-pushes-job-creation-to-record/ http://www.absolutbrazil.info/brazil-demand-pushes-job-creation-to-record/#comments Thu, 18 Feb 2010 19:45:53 +0000 NS http://www.absolutbrazil.info/?p=1160 Brazil Demand Pushes Job Creation to January Record

Feb. 18 (Bloomberg) — Brazil created a record number of jobs for the month of January, prompting traders to increase bets policy makers may start raising the benchmark interest rate as early as next month to keep inflation in check.

Latin America’s biggest economy created 181,419 jobs last month, led by manufacturers, compared with a loss of 101,748 jobs a year earlier, the Labor Ministry said in a report today in Rio de Janeiro.

Yields on interest rate future contracts maturing May 2010 through July 2011 rose after the report was released. The contract due January 2011, the most traded on Sao Paulo’s BM&F exchange, rose 1 basis point, or 0.01 percentage point, to 10.25 percent at 12:57 p.m. New York time.

“This figure clearly reinforces the view that the economy is expanding at a strong pace,” Pedro Tuesta, senior economist for Latin America at 4Cast Inc., said in a phone interview from Washington. “It increases the odds that the central bank may start raising rates in March.”

According to the median forecast in a central bank survey of about 100 analysts published yesterday, faster economic growth, fueled by domestic demand, will prompt policy makers to raise the benchmark interest rate in April from a record low 8.75 percent for the first time since September 2008 to keep inflation in check.

“Brazil is on track to reach an all-time high in job creation in 2010,” Labor Minister Carlos Lupi told reporters. “If there is an interest rate increase this year, it will be very small,” Lupi said.

Brazilian companies will continue to hire more workers throughout the year, driven by forecasts that the country will post “strong” growth in 2010, Aurelio Bicalho, an economist at Itau Unibanco, Brazil’s biggest non-state bank, said in an e- mailed comment.

Gross domestic product will expand 5.8 percent this year, after growing 0.2 percent last year, according to central bank estimates.

The government-registered job creation number is a balance of posts created minus job dismissals. Registered jobs, or so- called formal work, assure employees a range of benefits such as unemployment insurance, bonuses and retirement payments by the government.

Source: BusinessWeek.

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]]> http://www.absolutbrazil.info/brazil-demand-pushes-job-creation-to-record/feed/ Article - Brazil girds for massive offshore oil extraction http://www.absolutbrazil.info/article-brazil-girds-for-massive-offshore-oil-extraction/ http://www.absolutbrazil.info/article-brazil-girds-for-massive-offshore-oil-extraction/#comments Mon, 07 Dec 2009 13:49:49 +0000 NS http://www.absolutbrazil.info/?p=1157 Article - Brazil girds for massive offshore oil extraction

State-run Petrobras is poised to become a major global player

Everything about the shipyard here is colossal — the 4,000-man workforce, the billions sunk into it in capital costs, the half-finished 10-story-high production platforms.

But then, so is the challenge facing Brazil’s state-controlled energy company, Petrobras: developing a group of newly discovered deep-sea oil fields that energy analysts say will catapult this country into the ranks of the world’s petro-powers. The oil pools are 200 miles out in the Atlantic and more than four miles down, under freezing seas, rock and a heavy cap of salt.

Petrobras, which until recently was little known outside oil circles, has launched a five-year, $174 billion project to provide platforms, rigs, support vessels and drilling systems to develop tens of billions of barrels of oil. Energy officials here project that Brazil — still an oil importer five years ago — will in the next decade have one of the world’s biggest oil reserves.

“It’s going to change the role of Brazil in the geopolitics of oil,” Petrobras’s president, José Sergio Gabrielli, said in an interview at the company’s headquarters in Rio de Janeiro. “We are going to become a much bigger producer.”

Petrobras estimates that production in Brazil could reach 3.9 million barrels by 2020, up from more than 2 million a day now. Proven oil reserves would rise from 14.4 billion barrels to more than 30 billion barrels, according to government estimates, putting Brazil in the same league as such major oil exporters as Qatar, Canada, Kazakhstan and Nigeria.

The new discoveries in Brazil’s offshore “pre-salt” region do not mean that the country will become a major exporter of crude, according to Gabrielli. He noted that Brazil’s economy, which is the world’s eighth-largest and is steadily growing, is expected to consume much of Petrobras’s projected production. But, he added, as the country meets its own needs, it will also develop for export refined products such as gasoline, diesel and biofuels.

In an era of drum-tight supply, the discoveries off Brazil’s coast and Petrobras’s growing stature are changing the world’s oil balance, because few regions outside the OPEC countries are expected to generate significant growth in crude production, said Michelle Billig Patron, senior director of political risk for the New York-based Pira Energy Group.

“There is really only Canada and Brazil when you’re talking about a million barrels a day more in growth over the next 10 years,” Patron said.

A firm hits it big

The engine of that growth is a multinational that, for much of its 56-year history, was little more than a trading company. It pumped a few thousand barrels a day almost as a side note to its real function, overseeing oil imports. Then in 1974 — a time when oil shocks had alarmed Brazilian officials — came a major discovery: the offshore Campos Basin, east of Rio.

“Petrobras, before Campos, produced 180,000 barrels a day,” said João Carlos de Luca, a former Petrobras executive who is president of the Brazilian Petroleum Institute, which represents foreign oil companies here. “After Campos, it was a company that searched for self-sufficiency in production.”

In its drive to produce, Petrobras became a leader in offshore production. The Rio-based company is now responsible for more than a fifth of the world’s deep-sea operations, more than any other company, Gabrielli said. It operates in 26 countries and drills off the African coast and in the Gulf of Mexico.

With a market capitalization of more than $220 billion, Petrobras is one of the world’s 10 biggest companies. Over the past two years, it has been the most frequently traded foreign company on the New York Stock Exchange, trade data show. Among investors bullish on Petrobras is George Soros, who last year made the oil company the largest single holding in his investment fund, according to Bloomberg.

Still, the company remains firmly under the control of the state, with President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva calling it a national icon whose fortunes are intertwined with Brazil’s.

Though private investors control nearly 60 percent of Petrobras stock, the Brazilian government has 56 percent of the voting rights. Seven of its nine directors are from the government. The board’s chairwoman is Dilma Rousseff, a Lula confidant who is expected to be the ruling party’s candidate in next year’s presidential elections.

The Lula government is now seeking passage of a law to give Petrobras control over future projects in the newly discovered fields. Foreign companies have explored for oil in Brazil since 1997, but the proposed regulations would limit their ability to make major decisions involving the new oil pools.

Gabrielli said it is logical to make Petrobras the operator, with a mandatory 30 percent stake in each project, because Brazil took the risks to drill for oil in the pre-salt. But he noted that companies such as Exxon Mobil, Britain’s BG Group, Royal Dutch Shell and Spain’s Repsol are investing billions to develop their share of the new projects.

Luca, the president of the association representing foreign companies, said Petrobras may overextend itself. “We could be limiting the development,” he said.

Far out and deep down

The entire pre-salt region is laced with “elephant fields,” pools holding at least a billion barrels of oil each. Tupi, which in 2006 was the first field found, holds up to 8 billion barrels.

Despite the optimism that Petrobras officials display for visitors, they reel off the challenges: shifting salt, 6,500 feet of it, and working fields so far from the coast that they cannot be reached by helicopter.

Much of the new infrastructure needed to develop the pre-salt is being built here at Angra, and at other shipyards dotting the coast. On a recent day, decked out in a bright-orange jumpsuit and helmet, Roberto Moro, a mechanical engineer, strolled amid giant pontoons weighing 6,000 tons each. He explained how they would be latched together, then topped with a 14,000-ton deck the size of a football field.

The final product, a platform called P-56, will cost $1 billion, he said. And Petrobras will need a fleet of them.

“Each platform we are building here, like P-56, represents 10 percent of national oil production,” Moro, 46, explained. That is the equivalent of 180,000 barrels.

Source: The Washington Post.

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]]> http://www.absolutbrazil.info/article-brazil-girds-for-massive-offshore-oil-extraction/feed/ Article - Brazil Property To Top 2010 Property Wish List http://www.absolutbrazil.info/article-brazil-property-to-top-2010-property-wish-list/ http://www.absolutbrazil.info/article-brazil-property-to-top-2010-property-wish-list/#comments Wed, 02 Dec 2009 18:01:24 +0000 NS http://www.absolutbrazil.info/?p=1151 Article - Brazil Property To Top 2010 Property Wish List

Brazil’s property market is set to become one of the hottest markets in 2010. The country is one of the world’s fastest growing economies. Foreign Direct Investment has increased and with Brazil set to host the 2014 football World Cup and 2016 Olympic Games, we will see improvements in infrastructure and huge growth in the construction industry.

Property investors from around the world are flocking to Brazilian shores with a view to snapping up real estate, in anticipation of future capital growth.

Brazil Property Specialist, Colordarcy have seen Brazilian property enquiries increase by 60%, since the Olympic announcement. The company has responded by launching a consultancy service to help clients to source the best real estate deals in Rio de Janeiro.

Loxley McKenzie, Chief Executive at Colordarcy – is predicting an annual increase of 20% per annum – carrying through to the Olympic. He said, ‘The time to purchase Brazil real estate is now, I have no doubt that we will see incredible growth over the next few years’.

Mortgages will soon be available to international buyers and this will create a further boost to Brazil’s property market.

Investment banking firm Goldman Sachs believes that Brazil’s economic growth could outstrip that of the other BRIC (Brazil, Russia, India and China) nations over the next few years.

Brazil’s economy is widely expected to become the fifth largest in the world by the time the Olympic Games kicks off in 2016, and yet property and land prices still remain a fraction of those found in more developed nations.

The Brazilian president Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva has already pledged to spend up to £11.5bn on building a million new homes in Brazil between now and 2011.

It is time to Samba all the way to Brazil.

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]]> http://www.absolutbrazil.info/article-brazil-property-to-top-2010-property-wish-list/feed/ News - Carlyle Plans ‘Mid-$100 Million’ Deals in Brazil http://www.absolutbrazil.info/news-carlyle-plans-%e2%80%98mid-100-million%e2%80%99-deals-in-brazil/ http://www.absolutbrazil.info/news-carlyle-plans-%e2%80%98mid-100-million%e2%80%99-deals-in-brazil/#comments Wed, 02 Dec 2009 16:55:17 +0000 NS http://www.absolutbrazil.info/?p=1142 News - Carlyle Plans ‘Mid-$100 Million’ Deals in Brazil

Dec. 2 (Bloomberg) - Carlyle Group, the world’s second- largest private-equity firm, will soon announce two or three acquisitions in the “mid-$100 million” range in Brazil to take advantage of faster growth, said co-founder David Rubenstein.

The deals will be “very attractive,” Rubenstein told reporters in Sao Paulo, without giving details. He said it’s important for the group to invest in Latin America’s biggest economy because of its size and growth potential.

“You can’t be global not being in Brazil,” Rubenstein said. “Brazil has the world’s sixth-largest population, it’s the ninth-largest economy and will become the fifth largest.”

Private-equity companies such as Washington-based Carlyle are looking for new investments after the global recession triggered a two-year drought. Rubenstein said in October the best investment opportunities are in distressed assets, energy and health care. He said today bank lending has resumed since the financial crisis, which, triggered by record U.S. subprime mortgage defaults, effectively closed the buyout market.

“The deals are in the mid-$100-million range,” Rubenstein said. “We can’t have multi-billion-dollar deals in Brazil. Not for a while. Investors want to make higher returns on their money. If you do a $30 billion buyout and don’t make any return, it’s not better than making a $300 million deal.”

Initial Public Offerings

About 30 percent of initial public offerings in recent years involved companies with private-equity investments, Thomas Tosta de Sa of Brazil’s venture capital and private-equity organization said in an interview in July. About 450 companies in Brazil are private-equity backed, he said.

Companies such as Tivit Terceirizacao de Tecnologia e Servicos SA sold shares in initial public offerings this year after cancelling plans in 2008 amid the crisis. Banco Santander Brasil SA raised 12.3 billion reais ($7.15 billion) in a record IPO in October, topping the previous record by Cia Brasileira de Meios de Pagamento.

Brazil’s economy will expand 5 percent next year, according to the median estimate of about 100 economists in a Nov. 27 central bank survey. Gross domestic product is likely to grow 0.2 percent this year after banks resumed lending and government tax cuts spurred sales of vehicles and household appliances, according to the survey.

Source: Bloomberg.

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]]> http://www.absolutbrazil.info/news-carlyle-plans-%e2%80%98mid-100-million%e2%80%99-deals-in-brazil/feed/ Article - Brazilian Middle Class Expands As Economy Surges http://www.absolutbrazil.info/article-brazilian-middle-class-expands-as-economy-surges/ http://www.absolutbrazil.info/article-brazilian-middle-class-expands-as-economy-surges/#comments Tue, 01 Dec 2009 17:45:51 +0000 NS http://www.absolutbrazil.info/?p=1148 Article - Brazilian Middle Class Expands As Economy Surges

The cruel joke about Brazil was that it was the country of the future — and always would be. But now, Brazil is meeting its potential like never before.

Impressive economic growth, a booming commodity sector and the country’s popular government are receiving worldwide attention. The country’s center-left president, Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva — who as a boy shined shoes on the street — has led a crusade against poverty.

Innovative state programs, along with the economic growth, are lifting millions of Brazilians into the middle class and making the country a model for the developing world.

On a recent day in Rio de Janeiro, Renatta Mancini walks amid brightly colored skirts and blouses at the Cantao store in the city’s snazziest mall. A buyer for the upscale store, Mancini says business is good. She says the store’s clothing designs show originality and the highest of quality.

That quality is a trademark at Alan Roberto Lima’s small sewing shop on a narrow residential street in a rough neighborhood far from Rio’s glitz.

Lima, 34, is big and stoic — characteristics that served him well in the past, when he was dealing cocaine. But Lima says he turned to fashion a few years ago when he took stock of his life. He started by making T-shirts and shorts in his home.

It helped that Brazil was then beginning its economic transformation, and Lima praises the government for putting the economy on track — and keeping it there.

Lima calls it a revolution.

That revolution means Lima has joined the middle class. He owns a house and a car, and he is selling clothes to some of Rio’s trendiest shops, including Cantao.

Lima says he is now thinking of creating his own clothing line once he makes an investment in newer, more modern machinery. He even dreams of owning a shop in Rio’s wealthy south, right on the beach.

Brazil, with a land mass larger than America’s lower 48 states, was always said to be on the cusp of prosperity. Yet, one crisis after another held it back: hyperinflation, oil shocks, the Asia crisis, devaluations and defaults.

But today, Brazil is surviving the global economic downturn better than just about any country in the world. Once again, the economy is poised to grow by 5 percent.

Political analysts say Lula’s steady hand has won admirers the world over. That was never more apparent than in October, when Rio was awarded the 2016 Olympic Games.

Economists say Lula has been a responsible steward of the economy, following the lead of his predecessor, Fernando Henrique Cardoso, who tamed inflation.

Nonetheless, Brazil remains a country with desperate poverty and, in its poorest slums, untold violence. And the country’s business climate is far from perfect: Economists say an overbearing state bureaucracy makes it a slog to start a business. Roads and ports need vast improvements. Corruption is still a scourge.

But despite the red tape, businessmen are bullish about the country, which has embraced globalization.

Brazil is now the world’s eighth-largest economy, and that growth is trickling down — with 8.5 million jobs created since 2003, and 32 million people joining the middle class, according to Marcelo Neri, chief economist at the Center for Social Policies at the Getulio Vargas Foundation, a private think tank.

“Brazil is really having a wonderful time now, in terms of collecting, harvesting very good results. We used to say that Brazil is the country of the future. The future is now, it’s going on, it’s occurring now,” Neri says.

But it’s not just the healthy economy that is helping Brazil’s masses. Programs such as Bolsa Familia provide food payments to millions. In exchange, recipients must make sure their kids are in school. There are also low-interest loans for new homebuyers and for small businesses.

One of Rio’s most forbidding districts is Rocinha, which has a reputation as a tough favela, or slum. But it is also filled with opportunities: New businesses are cropping up, and old businesses are doing better.

Teresina Lopes Vieira da Silva sells spices and peppers from a street stand. But she is not just a street vendor: She has a successful business selling to upscale restaurants.

She credits a robust business environment — and two government-backed loans — for her good fortune. She says the loans helped her buy supplies in bulk, meeting the demands of her customers. Over the years, she has saved up to buy two homes.

She is not the only one making purchases.

The Ponto Frio appliance store in downtown Rio is filled with shoppers. In practically all major stores in Brazil, buyers are offered credit at low interest rates.

Dulcinea Fejeira bought her first computer two months ago. Now, she is looking for a new fridge.

Brazil is much better now, she says, adding that Brazilian friends who had created new lives for themselves in New Jersey, Florida and Italy are coming back.

Fejeira recalls growing up poor, and how she and her family toiled away to pay for her education. Now, she is a psychologist and, she says proudly, a member of Brazil’s expanding middle class.

Source: NPR.

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]]> http://www.absolutbrazil.info/article-brazilian-middle-class-expands-as-economy-surges/feed/ Article - Brazil’s winning bid provides Olympic lesson for the world http://www.absolutbrazil.info/article-brazils-winning-bid-provides-olympic-lesson-for-the-world/ http://www.absolutbrazil.info/article-brazils-winning-bid-provides-olympic-lesson-for-the-world/#comments Thu, 26 Nov 2009 16:59:26 +0000 NS http://www.absolutbrazil.info/?p=1144 Article - Brazil’s winning bid provides Olympic lesson for the world
By Ruth Melkonian

Recently, as the world waited for the International Olympic Committee (IOC) to announce its decision on the location of the 2016 games, many expected Chicago to win. After all, its most famous resident, the president of the U.S., had campaigned hard for its selection.

Instead, the IOC chose Rio de Janeiro, on grounds of its “strong technical bid” with “long-term aspirations for the future.”

Some reports said this would be “good for Rio de Janeiro.” But I’ve come to believe it might be the other way around: Showcasing Brazil through the Olympics could teach the world some important lessons.

For one, Brazil’s politics conform to neither of the two Latin American stereotypes: 1.) concentrating power on the left (Chavez in Venezuela) or 2.) concentrating power on the right (Uribe in Colombia).

Brazil’s democracy and economy in contrast are stable, its leadership international, and its society open. Brazil has left its monarchical and authoritarian history behind, and has now nearly 25 years of democratic rule, moving from oppression to freedom in admirable ways.

These last few decades, Brazil has pragmatically stabilized its economy and supported social programs simultaneously. It’s fought poverty through land reform and investments in health care and education. By facilitating economic growth via increased openness and fiscal prudence, employment and wages have risen, lifting many out of poverty and increasing the proportion of those who can be described as middle class from 38 percent to 50 percent since 2003.

Brazil’s economy is also wisely diversified and not solely dependent upon any one product or trade partner. It has attained energy independence, but offers other key commodities (sugar, soy, grains, etc.) along with significant service and manufacturing sectors (aircraft, textiles, automobiles, etc.). Brazil is not overly reliant on its trade with the U.S. or its neighbors, but has also built strong trade relationships with Europe, China, India and others.

Brazil is known as a leader of its region, and of the global Southern Hemisphere. While others make empty claims to such positions, I believe Brazil has done more to merit this.

It was a key leader of the walkout of the 2003 WTO meetings in Cancún over northern agricultural subsidies that unfairly disadvantaged the global south; became one of first nations to prioritize accessible ARV treatment for AIDS victims; and successfully fought U.S. drug companies via the WTO for flexible drug patent laws in times of public health crises.

Even at the latest G20 summit, Brazil won support for a greater share of voting power within the International Monetary Fund, and continues to press for a permanent seat on the UN Security Council and for reform of that body.

With a diverse society, Brazil is also known for its wide-ranging new social movements and interest groups. It supports religious freedom, has the largest Catholic population in the world and the largest Pentecostal population in Latin America.

This is not to say that Brazil has no problems. It does. For instance, its progress in economic development has too often come at a steep cost to its indigenous peoples and its environment. Though Brazil has one of the top 10 economies in the world, it continues to be troubled by unequal income distribution and racial inequality.

In the next few years, we could see increased violence in some Rio neighborhoods due to newly aggressive efforts to control gangs/militias. And I’m also worried that President Lula appears to be currying favor with some through irresponsible means, such as supporting Iran’s nuclear program and dismissing its democratic movement, and by failing to speak out more boldly against global human rights violators.

Still, I believe Brazil’s “underdog” story will continue to inspire us. As with its experience hosting previous international summits, Brazil has shown an ability to ensure calm in Rio, and it has seven years of Olympic preparations to address any other concerns. If it does, and if it approaches the Olympics in a way that builds on the best aspects of its development to become a global power, it will offer a model to the world that merits the gold.

Dr. Ruth Melkonian-Hoover is assistant professor of political studies at Gordon College whose specialty is Latin American politics. She and her husband Dennis and their family live in Hamilton.

Source: The Salem News.

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]]> http://www.absolutbrazil.info/article-brazils-winning-bid-provides-olympic-lesson-for-the-world/feed/ News - Brazil inflows seen robust despite controls-ANBIMA http://www.absolutbrazil.info/brazil-inflows-robust/ http://www.absolutbrazil.info/brazil-inflows-robust/#comments Wed, 25 Nov 2009 21:34:47 +0000 NS http://www.absolutbrazil.info/?p=1137 News - Brazil inflows seen robust despite controls-ANBIMA

*Inflows from Japan investors especially strong

*Healthy fundamentals, low inflation draws investments

*Japan investors put $1 bln into Brazil fund on Wednesday (Adds comments, background, byline)

TOKYO, Nov 25 (Reuters) - Brazil is expected to see strong foreign fund inflows backed by its healthy fundamentals and long-term growth prospects despite its recent capital control steps, an executive of a Brazilian financial body said on Wednesday.

Foreign portfolio investments by Japanese have been particularly strong and the pace has picked up since October, when Brazil was selected to host the 2016 Olympics, Pedro Bastos, a director of Brazilian Financial and Capital Markets Association (ANBIMA), told a news conference in Tokyo.

“If you are a long-term equity investor, a 2 percent tax on a market that’s up 80 percent on a nominal basis and 133 percent on a dollar basis is not a deterrent,” Bastos said.

But he said it will take time for the market to see the impact of Brazil’s one-month-old tax measure aimed at helping to brake appreciation of the country’s currency, the real.(BRBY)

Brazil will charge a 2 percent financial transactions tax on foreign investment flows in stocks and bonds, but the tax will be charged only once. [ID:n19264977]

Brazil has been attracting investors due to its healthy economic fundamentals, with its inflation well under control, Bastos said.

Increasing consumption and prospects of development of infrastructure linked to the Olympics and oil fields are also among key driving forces attracting investments, he said.

Bastos said the readiness of Japanese to invest in Brazilian equities and fixed-income products, as well as in the the real, had picked up significantly in the last two to three months.

“Japanese investors have been long-term investors. Even during the depths of the crisis last year we didn’t see any significant outflows,” Bastos said.

“They held onto their positions. Now that it has become clearer that the worst of the financial recession is over, I think their willingness to take risk is back again.”

Japanese individuals hold about $15 trillion in personal savings largely parked in low-yielding accounts, and retail investors have been taking on more risk as the global economy picks up and while the Tokyo stock market lags other markets.

Brazil’s key Bovespa stock index .BVSP has surged 80 percent since the start of the year, while as of Wednesday, Japan’s Nikkei average .N255 had risen only 7 percent.

Since the start of the year, retail investors have been taking on more exposure in mutual funds linked to Brazilian equities and bonds.

In addition, yield-hungry retail investors have been flocking into investment trust funds, similar to mutual funds known as “toushin”, that allow holders to select a currency, including the high-yielding real.

On Wednesday, new Brazilian equities toushins managed by Daiwa Asset Management were launched, drawing 93 billion yen ($1.05 billion) of funds from Japanese investors.

Another Brazilian toushin that invests in the Latin American country’s infrastructure-related shares is due to be launched later in the week.

Source: Reuters.

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