LATAM: Watch Brazil But Buy The Peso

Lior Alkalay - INO.com Contributor - Forex


LATAM currencies are back in the game. Optimism over Brazil’s political future is growing and commodities, a key driver of regional growth, are recovering. Together, much of the uncertainty looming over the region has been removed and put regional currencies -the Brazilian Real, Mexican Peso and Chilean Peso into favor.

One important gauge of rising optimism is the price of Credit Default Swaps. Credit Default Swaps, or CDS for short, measure the cost of insuring against a bankruptcy. When the price of Credit Default Swaps falls, it points on lower risk and higher optimism. As the chart below indicates, Credit Default Swaps have fallen dramatically across the region since February, signaling a surge in optimism in the LATAM space.

LATAM CDS Chart
Chart courtesy of Deutsche Bank

But the CDS chart illustrates another very interesting picture. While the fall in risk is across the board, Brazil, the largest economy in the region, is deemed as the most probable to default on its debt by a wide margin compared to much smaller regional peers. Continue reading "LATAM: Watch Brazil But Buy The Peso"

LatAM: First The Pain, Then The Gain?

Lior Alkalay - INO.com Contributor - Forex


Latin America is going to end 2015 with a big bang. The entire region has experienced what could only be described as a mini Latin Spring. The corrupt government of Argentina lost power to the pro-business leader, Mauricio Macri. Meanwhile, Venezuela's left-wing extremists suffered a defeat in Parliamentary elections. More recently, Brazil's president, Dilma Rousseff, is facing impeachment charges amid a corruption scandal.

All this naturally begs two questions; are the winds changing in the Latin American space and what does that mean for LatAm currencies? Continue reading "LatAM: First The Pain, Then The Gain?"

The Brazilian Real: From Bad To Ugly

Lior Alkalay - INO.com Contributor - Forex


Over the past two years, it seems, Brazil has remained in the headlines for the very worst of reasons – corruption. In fact, the very latest scandal at Petrobras, the state owned petroleum giant, reached all the way to its upper echelon. Long gone are the days when the Brazilian government was praised for its fiscal discipline; the situation there has become so notorious that the name Brazil, it seems, has become synonymous with corruption. And as if this were not bad enough the country's main exports, which range from iron ore to agricultural goods, have tumbled in crisis. Yet, as investors, we always seem to intuitively look at the bright side of even the worst situation; in this case, we have thoughts of buying because when the situation is as bad as it is, we think, from here on out, that the situation can only get better. The Brazilian economy is basically at a standstill with a weak government at the helm, and there is one corruption scandal seemingly after another, and given the softness in commodities' prices the question that investors want an answer to is this: is the collapse in the Brazilian Real over?

A Broken Banking System

While many see corruption as the core problem in Brazil, this writer thinks the true core and the basis of the problem is, in fact, rooted in the country's banking system and at its heart, with Brazil's central bank, the Banco Central do Brasil. While reforms in the country are key for future growth it is the credibility of its central bank that is key for the Real, and as the chart below reveals, credibility is sorely lacking.


Chart courtesy of Tradingeconomics.com

The central bank has marked the 4.5% as the desired target for inflation. Yet the Brazilian central bank, generally amid political pressure to spur growth, has always eased policy prematurely and too aggressively. However, when it comes to tightening, the fact is the central bank doesn't apply those same standards. When in 2009 inflation peaked, rates were cut quickly, to as low as 8.75%, and left unchanged for several months. Soon after, though, inflation spiraled out of control once again, above 7%. And yet again, the Brazilian central bank was behind the curve, tightening too slowly and allowing inflation to move outside its targeted range. Once inflation slowed to 4.91% the central bank once again cut rates, this time even more aggressively than before, and the results were not pretty. As seen in the chart, inflation was soon out of control, to the extent that the latest reading on inflation hit 8.13%, once again spurred on by a central bank that hands out rate cuts much too easily. Continue reading "The Brazilian Real: From Bad To Ugly"