Investments are coming to Brazil, says Guedes

In an interview on the night of this Thursday (22) with Itatiaia radio, Economy Minister Paulo Guedes said that Brazil is “is improving” and has become a “safe haven for investments” in the midst of the war against Ukraine.

“All the investments in the world are looking for a safe harbor. And since the biggest confusion is abroad, there is a confusion because inflation is rising, because there is a recession, because there is a war, and in Brazil it is the opposite,” he said.

The minister cites the latest results of the economy to attract investment. “There is growth, inflation is falling, job creation, unemployment is falling, 100 million Brazilians are working, GDP is growing by 3%. So, investments come to Brazil,” he said.

Guedes also spoke about the fight against inflation in the country, with the rise in interest rates having started before and now reaching the end of the high cycle, unlike some developed countries, such as the United States and the United Kingdom, which rose recently their interest rates.

“Brazil now has inflation going down, every time you see that inflation is revised downwards. We are going to have the biggest quarterly deflation in history, three straight months of falling inflation. So prices here are starting to go down, inflation is going down and interest rates have already stopped going up, getting ready to go down right there. While they are still soaring interest out there,” she said.

Guedes also spoke about the decrease in unemployment and the increase in growth expectations, with a positive outlook until the end of the year. “From here until the end of the year comes Black Friday, World Cup, Christmas. So Brazil can reach 3% growth. The world is starting to sink and Brazil is rising. Brazil is improving.”

The minister also commented on the surplus expectation for this year. “We had also predicted a deficit this year and it is showing a surplus, the first surplus in thirteen years. So we are conservatively predicting a slight deficit for next year, but we are very hopeful that it will happen as usual, we predict the deficit will come the surplus”, he said.

When talking about the situation of state-owned companies, Guedes said that today they make a profit. “We recovered these companies, we started to privatize these companies and we took these resources and we are transferring them to the most fragile. We are giving back to the Brazilian people the resources that were the Brazilian people, instead being diverted into bad politics, into corruption,” he said.

The image of Brazil abroad was another topic addressed by Guedes. “The president was going to speak yesterday at the UN [na conferência da Organização das Nações Unidas], the day before yesterday at the UN, were projecting figures of the president out there. Sabotaging Brazil’s image, speaking ill of Brazil, at the UN, right? So, it’s a lack of patriotism, sabotage, it’s absurd. They’re enemies of the country, they’re not helping the country, are they? So, this bad image out there existed at the beginning, but they gradually realized that Brazil is actually making an effort to fix all these problems.”

The minister highlighted that Brazil feeds 1 billion people and is helping the entire world to survive war and humanitarian crises.

Regarding Brazil’s entry into the OECD (Organization for Economic Development Cooperation), the minister said that the country “fulfilled the greatest number of requirements to be promoted”. “Brazil is in first place in the race to gain access to the organization of advanced countries that is the OECD. It is in first place, it was the one who fulfilled the most requirements to be promoted.”

The minister stated that the tax reduction that is taking place, such as the ICMS (Imposto sobre Circulação de Mercadorias e Serviços) on transport, telecommunications and fuels, facilitates the entry of foreign investments and facilitates the position in the OECD.

Spending ceiling

The minister commented on the spending cap and what are the objectives of this fiscal rule. “The roof was poorly constructed. To transfer money to states and municipalities during the Covid crisis I couldn’t, to transfer oil money to states and municipalities, and I couldn’t break the ceiling to pay the judiciary I couldn’t. So it was a poorly constructed roof. And what are we doing? Fixing the ceiling. We are going to repair this ceiling so that it can achieve its goals correctly. Don’t let the federal government swell, period.”

Regarding the sources of funds to maintain Auxilio Brasil at R$ 600, Guedes mentioned that he could carry out an administrative and tax reform “this year”. We can do this year the administrative reform and that part of the tax that we will have to do to be able to guarantee the R$600, to guarantee the additional R$200”, he said.

Still on actions for 2022, he recalled the plan for the privatization of the Port of Santos. “We are going to try to do it this year, there are airports still being sold as well, we keep working.”

Arena Special Elections Economy

THE CNN showed, at Arena Eleções, which aired this Thursday (22), the proposals for the Economy of the candidates for the presidency. The campaign representatives for the economic area of ​​the four best-placed candidates in the polls, according to the aggregator Locomotiva/CNN, were invited.

The program was attended by Guilherme Mello, coordinator of the economic program of candidate Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva (PT), Elena Landau, coordinator of the economic program of candidate Simone Tebet (MDB) and Mauro Benevides Filho, coordinator of the economic program of candidate Ciro Gomes (PDT).

CNN invited a representative of Jair Bolsonaro’s campaign (PL) but there was no return. The Ministry of Economy was also contacted, but the answer was that Minister Paulo Guedes cannot participate in debates due to the electoral period.

In the program, which was anchored by Raquel Landim and had the participation of analysts Fernando Nakagawa, Thais Herédia and Priscila Yazbek, the financing of social programs, the fiscal framework, inflation, privatization, reforms and the job market were discussed.