Brazil: Economic activity normalizes in July after truckers' strike
October 3, 2018
In July, economic activity increased 0.6% from the previous month in seasonally-adjusted terms, according to the Central Bank’s monthly indicator for economic activity (IBC-Br, Indice de Atividade Economica do Banco Central). The result was below June’s all-time high of 3.4%, which was distorted by the effects of a nationwide truckers’ strike that took place in May and early June. July’s result marked a return to normalization for the Brazilian economy and beat market expectations of a 0.2% increase.
On an annual basis, economic activity grew 2.6%, above June’s 1.9%. Annual average growth in economic activity rose to 1.5% in July from 1.3% in June.
Brazil GDP Forecast
The analysts surveyed for this month’s LatinFocus Consensus Forecast expect the economy to grow 1.6% in 2018, which is unchanged from last month’s estimate. For 2019, the panel of analysts sees GDP rising 2.5%, down 0.1 percentage points from the previous month’s estimate.
Author: Angela Bouzanis, Lead Economist
