BRASÍLIA: “This result took us a little by surprise. We were aiming for this but the surplus came a little earlier than expected. Our expectation had been for a deficit of $1 billion in April,” Maciel said. The latest result contrasted with April 2015, when the public current account showed a deficit of US$6 billion.
A depreciation of the Brazilian currency real and a deep recession have curbed demand for imports and supported exports in Latin America’s largest economy. In the first four months of the year, the total deficit reached US$7 billion.
In the past 12 months, the deficit climbed to a cumulative US$34 billion, or 1.97% of GDP. Before April’s results were known, the Central Bank projected a total deficit of US $25 billion in 2016.
