South America News in Focus -- Brazil, Ecuador and Chile

Articles collected from Bloomberg LP

Brazil --

Lula May Increase Brazil's Oil Take as Tupi Spurs Rules Review
By Jeb Blount

July 9 (Bloomberg) -- Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva (photo on the right) may boost the government's stake in oil fields after the largest discovery in the Americas since 1976 prompted a review of rules for how petroleum deposits are developed.

Lula is examining how Brazil and producers will share revenue from offshore deposits that may hold more than $6 trillion of oil at current prices. Lula said the Tupi discovery and nearby prospects will at least triple Brazil's crude reserves, and he wants the wealth to be shared nationwide.

``This oil is ours, it belongs to the people, not Petrobras or Shell,'' Lula said in a June 26 interview in Brasilia, referring to state-controlled Petroleo Brasileiro SA and Royal Dutch Shell Plc of The Hague. ``The wealth is not for the few, it's for the many.'' ....................

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Brazil May Take Other Measures to Curb Inflation (Update1)
By Adriana Brasileiro and Carla Simoes

July 9 (Bloomberg) -- Brazil will take ``all necessary measures'' to curb inflation that's accelerating faster than the government forecast, Planning and Budget Minister Paulo Bernardo said.

``Saying that nobody in the government is worried about inflation is an exaggeration,'' Bernardo said in a Bloomberg Television interview in Brasilia today. ``But we don't see any reason for panic. The government has

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Inflation as measured by the IPCA-15 index accelerated to 0.9 percent increase in the month through June 15, the fastest in four years, from a 0.56 percent rise in the previous month. The increase exceeded all estimates in a Bloomberg survey that forecast a 0.78 percent rise.......................

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Ecuador --

Ecuador's Dollar Bonds Rebound as Salgado Eases Default Concern
By Lester Pimentel

July 9 (Bloomberg) -- Ecuador's bonds rose, rebounding from their biggest rout in almost a year, after new Finance Minister Wilma Salgado said the government will keep paying its debt.

The extra yield investors demand to own Ecuador's debt rather than U.S. Treasuries narrowed 12 basis points, or 0.12 percentage point, to 6.53 percentage points at 10:04 a.m. in New York, according to JPMorgan Chase & Co.'s EMBI Plus index. The so-called spread surged 54 basis points yesterday, the most since Aug. 16. ........................

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The yield on Ecuador's 10 percent bonds maturing in 2030 fell 13 basis points to 10.71 percent, according to JPMorgan. The bond's price gained 1 cent to 94 cents on the dollar.

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Chile --

Chile Economists Lift 2008 Inflation Forecast to 7.5% (Update1) By Sebastian Boyd

July 9 (Bloomberg) -- Chilean economists raised their inflation forecast for this year by 2 percentage points, a central bank survey of economists showed.

Consumer prices will rise 7.5 percent this year, according to the median estimate of 36 economists in a survey carried out between July 2 and July 8. Economists had expected 5.5 percent inflation in last month's survey.

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Chile's central bank aims for inflation expectations inside its target range of between 2 percent and 4 percent over a two- year horizon. The median estimate of 31 economists in this month's survey was for inflation of 3.8 percent in June 2009. ..........................

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