“Brazil is losing international competitiveness,” John Welch, chief strategist for CIBC World Markets, the investment- banking arm of Canada’s fifth-largest bank, said by phone from New York. “They’re blaming all the problems on the exchange rate, but have ignored structural reforms.”
After a 7.5 percent expansion in 2010, Brazil’s growth last year trailed India and China -- its peers in the BRIC group of large emerging markets. Growth in the $2.4 trillion economy also lagged the International Monetary Fund’s forecast of 4.6 percent average growth in Latin America last year, while exceeding the 1.6 percent expansion forecast for advanced nations.