wsj.com

Brazil’s economic response to the coronavirus was a policy that – as we shall see – could not really be sustained. But its impact brought short-term economic benefits. The extra spending combined with the impact of looser quarantines meant that the economy performed more strongly than expected in the second half of 2020. In June 2020 the IMF had pr

Spending on foreign travel had amounted to $2.2bn in 2003. By 2008 Brazilians were spending $10.9bn on trips abroad, and by 2013, $25bn.

Perhaps the biggest concern is that Chinese investments and economic ties will cause companies and politicians to act in ways that are counter to Brazil’s national interest.

When Rousseff was impeached and the thirteen years of PT government ended in 2016, exports to China amounted to $35.6bn, which represented about 19 per cent of that year’s total exports. But in the following three years to 2019 sales to China doubled, and Brazil’s trade surplus with Beijing increased from about $5bn to $28bn. In other words, just a

China was another crunch issue. The foreign minister Ernesto Araújo wanted to reduce ties with China and talked about promoting links with India, Japan and South Korea. Bolsonaro himself had protested during his campaign that China was buying up Brazil and had objected to the way it was making strategic investments in areas such as minerals and ene