Brazil

Spain's infrastructure company Ferrovial SA is in talks to acquire from its Spanish rival Grupo Isolux Corsan SA three power transmission projects in Brazil, according to a Ferrovial letter seen by Reuters on Friday. Isolux is undergoing debt restructuring in Spain and has stopped development of the power transmission lines, whose licenses it obtained from the Brazilian government in licensing tenders in 2014 and 2015. Brazil's electricity watchdog, Aneel, is considering canceling the licenses and promoting a new tender to find a substitute for the battered Spanish company.

Oi SA could scrap a proposed three-year restriction on creditors swapping part of their debt for equity, in a sign that Brazil's No. 4 wireless carrier wants to lure bondholder support to exit bankruptcy protection faster, two people with knowledge of the matter said on Friday. The limit, which Oi included in a reorganization proposal on Sept. 5, drew creditor anger and helped slow the carrier's in-court restructuring. Chief Executive Officer Marco Schroeder told Oi's two bondholder groups this week that shareholders now seem less reluctant to accept a debt-for-equity swap, the people said.

As revolutionary as the Temer government’s proposed public spending cap could be, it’s far from the only measure Brazil needs to prevent a fiscal debacle. Among the many dysfunctions dogging Latin America’s biggest democracy -- prolonged recession, a loss-making pension system, systemic corruption -- one of the most insidious has gotten scant attention to now: explosive state and local debt, Bloomberg News reported. Consider Rio de Janeiro, which in June declared a state of financial calamity, the political equivalent to bankruptcy.

Brazil’s economy recorded its seventh straight quarterly contraction between July and September, disappointing hopes the new government of president Michel Temer could engineer a quick turnround in the fortunes of Latin America’s biggest economy, the Financial Times reported. The news on the economy, with gross domestic product contracting at an annual rate of 2.9 per cent during the third quarter, came after protesters fought pitched battles in the streets of Brasília overnight against a budgetary reform being voted on in the senate.

Commodities trader Glencore Plc presented the highest bid in an auction for the sale of a distressed Brazilian sugar mill and is well positioned to take control of the plant, a source with direct knowledge of the process said on Monday. The Swiss commodities powerhouse offered around 350 million reais ($103 million) for the unit, topping bids by five companies that took part in the auction for the Guararapes mill currently controlled by local firm Unialco, which has filed for bankruptcy and is under court protection against creditors.

Brazil is to join the Paris Club of wealthy sovereign creditors, becoming the first large developing economy to enter the group for two decades, as deteriorating global credit conditions spur governments to improve co-ordinated debt relief efforts, the Financial Times reported. Officials say the sharp rise in emerging market borrowing since the financial crisis has encouraged the group of lenders to expand its membership amid the re-emerging threat of debt crises in poorer nations. The last big emerging market to join was Russia in 1997.

MMX Mineracao e Metalicos SA , the mining company founded by former billionaire Eike Batista, has filed for protection from its creditors in a Brazilian court, citing slumping iron prices and economic adversity. In a securities filing late on Friday, MMX said: "The fall in iron ore prices and the context of political and economic instability made it impossible for the company to achieve its revenue targets." Brazil is mired in a two-year-long recession in what is its worst downturn since the 1930s. The bankruptcy filing also includes its iron-ore unit MMX Corumbá.

A newly formed group of dissident bondholders in Oi SA has retained G5 Evercore to advise it in the Brazilian carrier's in-court reorganization, which has recently turned more protracted amid shareholder and bondholder rifts. In a statement distributed late on Thursday, the International Bondholder Committee said São Paulo-based G5 Evercore was being asked to find common ground with stakeholders of the debt-laden Brazilian carrier, which filed in June for the country's largest-ever bankruptcy. The International Bondholder Committee was formed on Nov.

In what has already been a tumultuous year marked by the impeachment of former President Dilma Rousseff, Brazilians are bracing themselves for what promises to be Latin America’s trial of the century — the start of corruption hearings against her predecessor and mentor, the once wildly popular Mr Lula da Silva, the Financial Times reported.

The Brazilian government lowered its 2017 annual gross domestic product forecast to 1.0% from 1.6%, a sign that Latin America’s largest economy is struggling to rebound from a deep recession, The Wall Street Journal reported. Fabio Kanczuk, secretary of economic policy for Brazil’s Finance Ministry, made the announcement Monday at a press conference in Brasília. Low oil prices and the lingering effects of a massive corruption scandal have hammered the key oil-and-gas sector, as well as state-run Petróleo Brasileiro SA.