Haddad says he was 'quite concerned' about the Copom decision to keep the basic interest rate at 13,75% per year.
"I was quite concerned about yesterday's decision by our Copom to maintain, for the third time, the highest interest rate in the world," said the Finance Minister.
247 - Finance Minister Fernando Haddad stated that he was "quite concerned" about the decision of the Monetary Policy Committee (Copom), linked to the Central Bank (BC), which maintained the basic interest rate (Selic) at 13.75% per year.
“I was quite concerned about yesterday’s [Wednesday (3)] decision by our Copom to maintain for the third time the highest interest rate in the world in an economy that today has one of the lowest inflation rates,” Haddad said this Thursday (4), according to the G1.
The minister noted that although the Copom (Monetary Policy Committee) maintained interest rates at a high level, the ministry will continue working to "harmonize" the fiscal policy, defined by the government, with the monetary policy of the Central Bank.
"Even so, we will persevere in trying to harmonize fiscal and monetary policy, we will persevere in dialogue with the National Congress, we will persevere in dialogue with society, because we understand that this is a very important issue," he stated.
Haddad also stressed that the Central Bank's monetary policy restricts economic growth, but denied that there is "political pressure" on the Central Bank.
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"For my part, there will never be any kind of political pressure, in the pejorative sense of the term, on a public body that has legitimacy. I am fully committed to and clear about that, but it is indeed an issue that matters for fiscal policy, it matters for the reindustrialization of the country, it matters for the decision-making of businesspeople," he said.
Haddad's statements were made before the first meeting of the Council for Sustainable Economic and Social Development (CDESS), the "Big Council," at the Itamaraty Palace in Brasília.
At the meeting, the President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva (PT) criticized the president of the Central Bank, Roberto Campos Neto."Everyone has to be careful, nobody talks about interest rates, as if one man alone could know more than the minds of 215 million people," said Lula.