ADVERTISEMENT

Brazil Lays Out Bold Targets to Privatize and Balance Budget

Brazil Lays Out Bold Targets to Privatize and Balance Budget

(Bloomberg) -- Brazil’s Economy Minister Paulo Guedes on Wednesday laid out bold targets for selling off state assets and balancing the budget.

The University of Chicago-trained economist said on Bloomberg Television in Davos that revenue of $20 billion this year from privatizations as well as a pension reform would help slash the budget deficit from currently 7 percent of gross domestic product to zero.

"We won’t balance it permanently, for that we’ll need reforms," Guedes said in the interview.

The real gained nearly 1 percent against the U.S. dollar after Guedes spoke.

Guedes is accompanying President Jair Bolsonaro at the World Economic Forum in Davos. He is seen as the guarantor of market-friendly measures in the administration, pushing proposals to open the economy and downsize the state.

"We are 40 years late on the liberalization agenda," he said.

To contact the reporters on this story: Raymond Colitt in Brasilia at rcolitt@bloomberg.net;Jonathan Ferro in London at jferro10@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Vivianne Rodrigues at vrodrigues3@bloomberg.net, Bruce Douglas, Matthew Malinowski

©2019 Bloomberg L.P.