The dollar opened this Wednesday (13) lower against the real, which followed the resilience of some of its peers from emerging countries – such as the Mexican peso and the South African rand – in the face of the international rise in the US currency, while investors digested much stronger than expected domestic data on the retail sector.
At 9:09 am (GMT), the spot dollar retreated 0.27%, to R$ 4.6638 on sale.
On B3, at 9:09 am (GMT), the first-maturity dollar futures contract dropped 0.21% to R$4.6845.
The day before, the US currency fell 0.32%, to R$4.6763 on sale
The day before, the Brazilian Stock Exchange abandoned the uptrend of the early hours to end the day down under the important influence of the American stock market.
Investors reacted to the release of March inflation data in the United States, which advanced to a rate of 8.5% in 12 months. It is the biggest annual price increase in the country since 1981.
The stock exchange’s reference index, the Ibovespa, dropped 0.69%, to 116,146 points, closing down for the third consecutive trading session.
As expected by analysts, the US inflation index gave the market the initial impression that the Fed (Federal Reserve, the US central bank) could avoid bumps in the increase that will promote the country’s benchmark interest rates in early May. Reading that changed throughout the day.
In New York, the stock market began to fall during the afternoon, as inflation data began to be assimilated.
The benchmark S&P 500 closed down 0.34%. The technology-focused market tracked by the Nasdaq index dropped 0.30%. This is the sector most penalized by high interest rates, as it depends on credit to advance with projects and present growth. The Dow Jones index lost 0.26%.
Increases in interest rates in the US can make the country’s fixed income advantageous to the point of attracting dollars currently invested in stock exchanges and in fixed income in emerging economies. This could force countries like Brazil to raise their interest rates even further to avoid capital flight and the consequent increase in inflationary pressure.
The market is working with the expectation of a 0.50 percentage point increase at the next Fed meeting. It is a bigger advance than the 0.25 percentage point signaled by the monetary authority in March, when the country’s interest rates left zero and had the first increase since 2018.
Comments made on Tuesday by Lael Brainard, a Fed director awaiting Senate confirmation to serve as the bank’s vice president, reiterated the US monetary authority’s willingness to take an aggressive stance against inflation.
“Inflation is very high,” Brainard said at a Wall Street Journal event. “Reducing inflation will be our most important task.
with Reuters
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