NEWS FLASH

UPCOMING WEBINAR - PANAMA IN FOCUS: US RELATIONS, CANAL STRATEGY AND FI...

Deputy Sabino expected to replace Carneiro at the Ministry of Tourism, Barroso’s statement on “defeating Bolsonarismo” caused negative reactions, and Lula said the Desenrola program should be launched next week
BRAZIL POLITICS · Report · 14 Jul 2023

The government officially invited Deputy Celso Sabino (União-PA) to replace Daniela Carneiro at the Ministry of Tourism. The government now hopes it can broaden the party's support in Congress. Celso Sabino's inauguration should take place next week. At an event of the National Union of Students ...

GULF WEEKLY: Gulf financing comes through for Pakistan and Egypt, Kuwait’s finance minister resigns, Bahrain’s current surplus narrows on weak oil output
GULF COUNTRIES · Report · 14 Jul 2023

A skimmable summary overlaid with our analysis and links. Headlines: * Oil is at its highest since April, and OPEC forecasts strong demand growth in 2024. * Saudi and UAE facilitated the IMF agreement with Pakistan with $3bn in deposits. * The UAE is also contributing $800m more to help Egyp...

Topic of the week: Headwinds for external positions mount
CAUCASUS / CENTRAL ASIA · Report · 14 Jul 2023

Balance of Payment data for 1Q23, released for all of our countries except Tajikistan, suggest that headwinds for CCA external positions are gaining strength. This is generally driven by a combination of strong GDP growth spilling into imports and an emerging picture of moderating remittances fro...

Another downside inflation surprise
ISRAEL · In Brief · 14 Jul 2023

Another downside inflation surprise Inflation in June reflected price stability (zero change) and the annual rate declined to 4.2% y/y from 4.6% in May. There were several items which surprised on the downside including food items (up only 0.6%, half our estimate), housing prices remained nearly ...

Uzbekistan: Broad-based moderation of price growth in Jun to warrant further rate cuts
CAUCASUS / CENTRAL ASIA · In Brief · 14 Jul 2023

Inflation dropped to 9.0 percent in June, the lowest level in the last 6 years. Headline CPI fell into single digits last month for the first time since Jan 2017. Inflation had been inching up over the course of 2022, hitting 12.3 percent YoY in Dec’2022 (9.8 percent in Jan’ 2022). However, favor...

Bi-Weekly Economic News Summary
KAZAKHSTAN · In Brief · 13 Jul 2023

Jun 30 KazTransOil: The company increases oil supplies from Kazakhstan to Germany through Russia's Transneft pipeline. Since the beginning of the year it exported 290K tons Poll: Analysts expected Kazakhstan's GDP to grow by 4.2-4.8% y-o-y in 1H23 Jul 3 Russia: Mr. Abayev, previously Deputy Secre...

Tax Reform continues to be discussed in Congress, negotiations on ministerial staff changes continue, and a decree on the sanitation sector was published today
BRAZIL POLITICS · Report · 13 Jul 2023

Despite the slower pace in Congress, Tax Reform continues to receive attention from the government and legislators. Yesterday, Fernando Haddad met with the rapporteurs of the proposal in the House and Senate, and the president of the Senate. Negotiations on ministerial staff changes continue at f...

Georgia: Trade deficit stabilizes, but remains large
CAUCASUS / CENTRAL ASIA · In Brief · 13 Jul 2023

Trade deficit remained large over Jan-Jun, pointing to a deterioration of the current account deficit in 2023 against the backdrop of moderating remittances from Russia. Trade data as of Jun shows that the goods deficit remains large, running at US$8.7bn on a 12-month basis (Graph 1). The sizable...

NATO Summit 2023 – mixed feelings but an apparent step forward
UKRAINE · In Brief · 13 Jul 2023

All the developments at the NATO Summit in Vilnius triggered multiple emotional reactions from Ukraine. It would be a stretch to say that Ukrainian authorities had a poor understanding of the unfolding events or held unrealistic expectations. However, President Volodymyr Zelenskiy did require som...

Drone attack on Kyiv does minimal damage
RUSSIA / FSU POLITICS · In Brief · 13 Jul 2023

On July 12 Kyiv was attacked by 11 Russian drones for the second night in a row. Ukraine said it destroyed all 11. No casualties were reported in Kyiv.On July 11 Kyiv was attacked by 26 drones and Ukraine claimed to have shot them all down.On July 12 in another city 2 civilians were wounded by th...

NATO Summit does not set a date for Ukrainian membership
RUSSIA / FSU POLITICS · In Brief · 12 Jul 2023

On July 11 NATO met in Lithuania. The host is a former Soviet state, which is symbolically important. The President of Lithuania was just elected in June 2023. President Nauseda is an outspoken advocate of Ukraine's cause. Zelensky was invited to attend. It is very rare for non-NATO leaders to be...

The current account narrows in 2Q23 but could widen in 3Q23 amid a weaker ruble, while the latter will support budgetary revenue
RUSSIA ECONOMICS · In Brief · 12 Jul 2023

The CBR reported that Russia's current account surplus narrowed to $5.4 bn in 2Q23 from $20.2 bn in 1Q23. The regulator also mentioned that in June alone, the current account surplus turned negative. Note, that these data are very preliminary and will be revised in the future. Nonetheless the 2Q2...

Russia tries to persuade emigrants to come home
RUSSIA / FSU POLITICS · In Brief · 12 Jul 2023

In 2022 over 700,000 Russians emigrated. There were others who left and have already returned to Russia. Most of those who left the country were young men seeking to evade conscription. The men who emigrated are mostly highly educated. They can easily work abroad and are more likely to be anti-wa...

Senator Eduardo Braga will be the rapporteur for Tax Reform in the Senate, the proposal will likely change in the Senate, and the government reached an agreement on the sanitation framework
BRAZIL POLITICS · Report · 12 Jul 2023

The rapporteur for the Tax Reform proposal in the Senate was chosen—Senator Eduardo Braga (MDB-AM). He guarantees that the Senate will approve the proposal, but also recognizes that there will be changes to the text. The likelihood of changes in the text is high. For the text to be enacted, it mu...

Erdogan greenlights Sweden’s NATO membership, but why?
TURKEY · In Brief · 12 Jul 2023

Turkey’s ever-so-inscrutable leader Erdogan staged another phenomenal U-turn greenlighting Sweden’s NATO membership after a summit with Stoltenberg and Swedish PM Ulf Kristersson. Turkish parliament is scheduled to ratify Swedish accession in a few days. On the face of it, two critical steps by S...