Brazil’s federal government plans to bail out the state of Rio de Janeiro with 2.9 billion reais ($849 million) as it struggles with a fiscal crisis less than two months before the Olympic Games begin, The Wall Street Journal reported. According to a presidential decree published late Tuesday, the transfer is to be used for public security during the Olympics and Paralympics, set to be held in August and September, respectively.

Brazil’s Oi SA, a telecommunications company that recently filed the largest bankruptcy in the country’s history, is seeking court protection in the U.S. to shield its assets from an affiliate of hedge fund Aurelius Capital Management LP, one of its holdout bondholders, The Wall Street Journal reported. Oi and several affiliates sought chapter 15 protection—the section of the bankruptcy code that deals with international insolvencies—at the U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Manhattan on Tuesday, with a debt load of $19 billion.

The bankruptcy petition of mobile phone carrier Oi SA, the biggest ever in Brazil, poses no threat to the country's financial system, central bank director Aldo Mendes said on Tuesday, Reuters reported. The company's petition late on Monday to seek protection from creditors on 65.4 billion reais ($19.2 billion) in liabilities, raised alarms about the exposure of local lenders. Speaking at an event in Sao Paulo, Mendes, director of monetary policy, also said the bank is waiting on international economic events before deciding whether to intervene in the local currency market.

Venezuela is “highly unlikely” to have enough hard currency to fully make its debt payments this year, although a default isn’t inevitable, according to a report from Moody’s Investors Service, Bloomberg News reported. State-owned oil company Petroleos de Venezuela SA, which has large payments due this year, is likely to default before the sovereign, the credit ratings company said. That, in turn, could imperil government finances to the point it won’t be able to make payments either, according to the report.

Venezuela is convulsing from hunger, the International New York Times reported. Hundreds of people here in the city of Cumaná, home to one of the region’s independence heroes, marched on a supermarket in recent days, screaming for food. They forced open a large metal gate and poured inside. They snatched water, flour, cornmeal, salt, sugar, potatoes, anything they could find, leaving behind only broken freezers and overturned shelves. And they showed that even in a country with the largest oil reserves in the world, it is possible for people to riot because there is not enough food.

Brazil’s troubled telephone company Oi SA on Monday filed the largest bankruptcy protection request in the country’s history just days after debt restructuring talks with creditors collapsed, The Wall Street Journal reported. The filing of Oi and six subsidiaries lists 65.4 billion reais ($19.26 billion) in debt. In its filing, the company said it chose judicial reorganization to preserve the value of its holdings and to continue providing service to its customers.

An ambitious constitutional amendment to freeze budget spending would cut the uncertainty over public finances that is the root cause of Brazil’s deep recession, according to the country’s new finance minister, the Irish Times reported on a Financial Times story. “With this kind . . . of tough fiscal policy . . . everyone will be able to project the numbers,” Henrique Meirelles said.

Whether crisis-ridden Venezuela will default is a question increasingly on the minds of bond traders. It’s now also one that is getting front-page treatment from China, one of the Latin American country’s biggest financial backers, Bloomberg News reported. On June 11, the People’s Daily -- the mouthpiece paper of China’s Communist Party -- published an article in its overseas edition with the headline “Will Venezuela Default?” After considering its willingness and ability to pay, the author concludes the answer is no and chalks up all the talk about default to media speculation.

For Mauricio Macri, there may be a silver lining to the Panama Papers scandal that has dogged Argentina’s new president since he was accused of ties with offshore shell companies earlier this year, the Financial Times reported. Mr Macri is hoping that his plan for a massive tax amnesty will be helped by increasingly tough conditions globally for tax dodgers, as he attempts to restore normality to what is one of the world’s most financially volatile countries.

Pedro Parente is on a mission to restore financial health and public trust to Petrobras, the Brazilian state-controlled oil company that for the past two years has been at the center of the country’s biggest-ever corruption scandal, Bloomberg News reported. A veteran business leader, Parente said his immediate task as the new chief executive officer of the world’s most indebted crude producer is slashing leverage without turning to the government for a bailout. Then the company will be able to focus on accelerating deep-water projects through greater cooperation with its partners, he said.