Monday Chileans will have a glimpse of the country’s economic activity in June, with the last reading showing a 4.9% expansion. Moody’s downgraded Chile’s ratings to A1 from Aa3 on July 26 saying it will be harder for the country to resume growth at the same level as before the commodity shock of 2014. In Mexico, data on fixed investments is expected to show a decline year-on-year, from 10.5% to 9.4%. In Brazil the auto industry, a gauge on Brazilian’s appetite for durable goods and perspectives for the industry, will publish their performance last month.
Colombia steals the limelight on Tuesday with the inauguration of Ivan Duque and his vice-president Marta Ramirez. In Argentina, the monetary policy committee will meet and Goldman Sachs’ Alberto Ramos expects rates will be kept at 40%, given the “inflation and foreign exchange challenging scenario”. Brazil, which kept its basic rate at 6.5% in a unanimous decision, will learn more about the policy makers’ reasoning when the central bank publishes the minutes for the last meeting. Later in the day Chile’s trade numbers for last month will be made public.
Then Wednesday is Chile’s turn to publish minutes of their last monetary meeting when rates were kept at 2.5%. In Brazil it is inflation day with two indicators, IPCA and the IGP-DI for July, an index that helps shed light on the effects of the real fluctuations against the dollar that showed further pressure in May with inflation at 1.48%. Statistics office IBGE publishes the consumer price index IPCA for July; in May the index showed prices rising 4.39% on an annual basis, and 1.26% on a monthly comparison.
Thursday Peru’s monetary policy committee meets to decide the basic interest rate. Goldman’s Ramos sees a hold at the 2.75% level and highlights that the the Andean country’s economy surprised markets in May growing at 6.4%, above an expected 5.2%. In Mexico the statistics office will publish consumer price variations with the July IPC projected to come at 0.31% on the monthly reading, below the 0.39% read in June.
In Brazil the week closes with retail sales in June, and the expectation is for further contraction after a -0.6% on the month to month reading in May, and Mexico will publish industrial production variation for June with the expectation of a stronger result after a 0.3% growth in May. In Colombia, another set of monetary decision minutes will be made public with the details on the July 27th decision to keep rates at 4.25%.