Brazil’s economy will grow 6.1 percent in 2010, bolstered by rising domestic demand, increasing exports and higher investment, according to Banco Bradesco SA, the country’s second-largest bank by market value.
Bradesco’s forecast is the most bullish among economists tracked by Bloomberg. A survey of 15 economists predicts a 3.8 percent expansion for Latin America’s biggest economy next year.
Brazil’s gross domestic product will accelerate from 0.5 percent this year as record-low interest rates boost consumer demand and commodity exports to emerging markets such as China increase, chief economist Octavio de Barros wrote in a report obtained by Bloomberg News. The report was presented to clients in New York earlier this week.
Bradesco’s forecasts are higher than estimates for 0.2 percent growth for 2009 and 5 percent for 2010 in a central bank survey of about 100 economists released on Nov. 23.
The central bank may need to raise borrowing costs earlier next year than previously forecast as tax cuts fuel consumer spending and threaten inflation targets.
Osasco, Brazil based Bradesco also predicted the benchmark interest rate, the Selic, will rise to 11.5 percent next year from the current 8.75 percent
Bradesco, the second-largest bank after Itau Unibanco Holding SA, also forecast a current-account deficit of as much as $64.7 billion next year, almost double the $33.41 billion reached in 1998, which was the widest since the central bank started tracking the data in 1947.
Growing imports, spurred by a stronger currency, have led economists to raise their 2010 estimates for seven consecutive weeks to $35.5 billion, according to the same survey.
The government increased spending 16.5 percent in the first 10 months of 2009 compared with last year as President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva seeks to fuel the economy’s recovery from its first recession since 2003.
The country’s trade surplus will narrow to $509 million in November, from $1.3 billion last month, according to a Bloomberg survey of four economists. The Trade Ministry will release the data on Dec. 1.
The real is the world’s second best-performing currency this year against the U.S. dollar, with a 33 percent gain that only trails the 50 percent advance in the Seychelles rupee. The benchmark Bovespa stock index has rallied 77 percent.
By Camila Fontana
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