GlobalSource Partners | Country Insights

On March 25 Putin made the announcement. He claimed that this was nothing out of the ordinary. He added that Russia would send depleted uranium ammunition to be used in Ukraine if Ukraine received depleted uranium. On March 24 the UK said it might provide depleted uranium shells to Ukraine becaus...

Russian pardons 5,000 criminals for joining Wagner

RUSSIA / FSU POLITICS · In Brief · 25 Mar 2023

On March 25 the head of Wagner said that the men had been pardoned. In 2022 Wagner recruited up to 50,000 men from prisons. They had to serve 6 months at the front to earn a pardon. Some were Russian but they came from countries such as Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan and Zambia. In Russia people can be g...

India says that Russia is not delivering on arms sales

RUSSIA / FSU POLITICS · In Brief · 25 Mar 2023

On March 24 the Indian Air Force made the statement. The IAF has not publicly said what the purchase was that has not been delivered. The IAF stated that Russia has said in writing that it is unable to deliver on schedule. The contract was worth USD 844 million contract, and about USD 740 million...

Guatemala confronts a less dynamic year.

CENTRAL AMERICA · Report · 24 Mar 2023

Guatemala´s economy faced several challenges in 2022, such as high domestic inflation, less favorable external conditions and high interest rates. The economy nonetheless recorded strong growth, good external accounts and stability in fiscal figures and in the financial sector. Guatemala´s econom...

GULF WEEKLY: All except Kuwait hike rates, Saudi relations with Iran and Syria advance, Kuwait’s political crisis deepens

GULF COUNTRIES · Report · 24 Mar 2023 · 1 response

A skimmable summary overlaid with our analysis and links. Headlines: * Gulf central banks, except for Kuwait’s, mirrored the Fed’s +25bp hike, as usual. * S&P upgraded Saudi Arabia’s credit rating to A, and Moody’s added a positive outlook. * Saudi and Qatari investors were hit hard by Credi...

The House and Senate reached an agreement on the MPs submitted by Bolsonaro but not the ones from Lula, President Lula travels to China this weekend, and Arko holds a conference with several government leaders on Monday.

BRAZIL POLITICS · Report · 24 Mar 2023

The House and Senate reached an agreement on the 13 pending provisional measures (MPs) submitted by former President Jair Bolsonaro. The MPs will be put to a vote in the House next week. An agreement still has not been reached on the MPs submitted by President Lula. This weekend, President Lula w...

Falling inflation on the back of FX strength?

URUGUAY · Forecast · 24 Mar 2023

In February, CPI inflation continued declining, to 7.6%y/y, while Industrial production´s 12-month accumulated growth rate fell to 3.0% y/y. As might have been expected, the BCU decided at its most recent COPOM meeting not to raise the reference interest rate any further, keeping it at the histor...

Bi-Weekly Economic News Summary

KAZAKHSTAN · In Brief · 24 Mar 2023

Mar 13 S&P: Oil production in Kazakhstan in Feb amounted to 1.55 mbd, while the country quota within the OPEC+ deal, was 1.63 mbd S&P: The agency confirmed credit ratings of Samruk-Kazyna (BBB-) and its subsidiaries KEGOC (BB+), KMG (BB+), KazTransOil (BB+), and KTZ (BB), the outlook has been cha...

Notes from Bilge Yilmaz breakfast

TURKEY · In Brief · 23 Mar 2023 · 1 response

On Tuesday, I and 6 of my economist/columnist colleagues were invited to breakfast by Bilge Yılmaz, head of economic policy at IYIP. I wanted to share my impressions from the “on-the-record” part of the conversation. The “off-the-record” part was largely anecdotes and conversation about politicia...

Legislation regarding the judicial changes will proceed next week

ISRAEL · In Brief · 23 Mar 2023

Netanyahu announced tonight (Thursday) that the legislation regarding the change in the judicial committee which appoints Supreme Court judges will proceed next week as planned. This proposal will enable the coalition to appoint the head of the Supreme Court and replace two judges (out of 15), wh...

MPC stays on hold

TURKEY · In Brief · 23 Mar 2023

We are happy to report that there is almost nothing to report from today’s CBRT/MPC meeting. The Committee kept the policy rate unchanged at 8.5%, in line with our expectation, versus a more divided set of views in the analyst community (link here). The Bank kept the sentence on the policy outloo...

The presidents of the House and Senate have not reached an agreement on the issue regarding the analysis of provisional measures, and the Central Bank maintained the interest rate

BRAZIL POLITICS · Report · 23 Mar 2023

Pacheco insists on following the analysis process provided by the Constitution, which states a Joint Committee should be created. A joint committee to analyze provisional measures would have 13 federal deputies and 13 senators. Arthur Lira argues that this distribution is disproportionate since t...

Monetary Board raises interest rates by 25bp

PHILIPPINES · In Brief · 23 Mar 2023

As Governor Felipe Medalla signaled earlier, the Monetary Board raised its set of policy rates by 25bp, bringing the overnight borrowing rate to 6.25% effective tomorrow. Per the Governor, the decision to increase policy rates was mainly influenced by still rising core inflation in February, stil...

Kazakhstan macro: economic growth to remain stable in 2023

KAZAKHSTAN · Report · 22 Mar 2023

Two weeks ago, the National Bank of Kazakhstan published its bi-monthly monetary policy report and enclosed its updated macroeconomic forecast for 2023 and beyond. Apart from the usual baseline scenario, the regulator considered two others, the “optimistic” and the “pessimistic” scenarios. From t...

More drone strikes as Xi leaves Russia

RUSSIA / FSU POLITICS · In Brief · 22 Mar 2023

On March 22 the Chinese President flew home. There was a drone strike on the Russian naval base at Sevastopol that Russia claimed to have fended off. Russia said no damage was inflicted by the drones. The Russian Governor of Crimea said it is false to say, as some have, that people are leaving Cr...