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Weekly Report - 19 April 2012 (WR-12-15)
BRAZIL: Mantega’s ‘war’ on interest rates
The Brazilian government is gearing up to take on the banking sector, pushing financial institutions to reduce the exorbitant high double-digit interest rates charged to local consumers and investors. On 12 April Finance Minister Guido Mantega took a pop at private banks, saying that the conditions were ripe locally for the sector to reduce the banking spread (the percentage difference between the interest rate charged on a bank loan and the lender’s funding costs). Days earlier the leading state banks, Banco do Brasil and Caixa Econômica, said that they would slash their rates dramatically, in Caixa’s case by up to 88%.
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