President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva classified the current level of interest rates as an “excrescence”: 13.75% per year. Although he promised not to talk about monetary policy, the head of the Executive dedicated part of his speech at Fiesp to again attacking the work of the Central Bank (BC), taking care, however, not to mention this time the head of the autarchy, Robert Campos Neto.
“The country does not deserve this”, declared Lula, after criticizing current interest rates, recalling the role of the National Bank for Economic and Social Development (BNDES) in the recovery of companies in the 2008 crisis, when the president was in his second term.
When closing the Industry Day event at Fiesp, the president said that it is necessary to put money in the market. “How will small and medium-sized companies survive if they don’t have credit?” he asked.
When demanding a position from the business community, Lula recalled that, when he was the one who nominated the BC president, Fiesp appeared in the headlines criticizing interest rate decisions at every meeting of the Monetary Policy Committee (Copom). “In this country, where the financial market has taken over, the President of the Republic cannot criticize the BC president”, joked Lula.
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