Brazilian financial-market analysts and economists raised their 2011 and 2012 inflation forecasts, a survey by the Brazilian central bank showed Monday.
The weekly survey places the 2011 year-end forecast for Brazil’s inflation rate at 5.75%, up from 5.66% a week earlier. The estimate is above the central bank’s inflation target of 4.5% for the year.
Survey respondents also increased their average estimate for 2012 inflation to 4.70% from 4.61%.
Last year, the country’s inflation rate reached 5.91%-the highest since 2004, when inflation hit 7.6%.
The central bank’s weekly survey tracks the opinions of 100 analysts and economists from banks and brokerages and reports the average of their expectations.
The average estimate for 2011 gross domestic product growth was lowered to 4.5% from 4.6%, while that for 2012 was steady at 4.5%, the survey showed.
Respondents kept their average forecast for the benchmark Selic interest rate at the end of 2011 at 12.50%. For 2012, analysts increased their Selic rate view to 11.25% from 11%.
The average expectation for Brazil’s debt-to-GDP ratio at the end of this year increased to 39.20% from 39.09%.
The forecast for this year’s foreign-trade surplus increased to $10.03 billion, from $9.57 billion. Analysts expect Brazil to post a current-account deficit of $67.49 billion at the end of the year.
Brazil’s currency, the real, is expected to end this year at BRL1.72 against the U.S. dollar, the survey showed.
-By Rogerio Jelmayer, Dow Jones Newswires
Things are getting pretty tight here in Sao Paulo and the inflation is definitely effecting my pockets. They are normally far more empty that they were in the past!