VENTURE CAPITAL POST

By picking a banker instead of an oil executive to run Petrobras, Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff appears to have recognized that the state-run company's biggest priority is to clean up its books and acknowledge how many billions of dollars it lost to a corruption scheme in recent years.

Brazil's President Dilma Rousseff tapped a confidant from a state-run bank to be the next head of Petrobras on Friday, chilling investor hopes that a more independent new management team would steer the oil firm out of a huge corruption scandal.

Brazil's President Dilma Rousseff urged her cabinet on Tuesday to embrace fiscal belt-tightening and other measures aimed at restoring business confidence and growth in her second term.

Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff's crusade to win back investor confidence has entrusted policymakers with the tough mission of hiking interest rates while major central banks cut them, raising the prospect of another recession in Latin America's biggest economy.

Brazil's government plans to rework parts of the country's new mining code currently stalled in Congress, the new Mines and Energy Minister Eduardo Braga said on Thursday.

Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff, dogged by a multibillion-dollar corruption scandal at state-run oil company Petrobras, vowed on Thursday to stamp out graft at the flagship firm and place it under strict corporate governance.

Brazilian retailers are expecting their worst Christmas season in a decade and signs are pointing to an unhappy New Year ahead.

Brazil's efforts to bring down its debt will translate into renewed investor confidence and additional room to continue poverty-reduction policies for the years to come, incoming Finance Minister Joaquim Levy said on Saturday.

Global equity markets slipped on Monday, hit by weak German business sentiment and another decline in oil, while Brazil slumped after incumbent Dilma Rousseff narrowly won a second term over an opponent seen as more pro-business.

U.S. stocks ended near flat on Monday, pausing after the S&P 500's biggest weekly gain since January 2013, while energy shares fell with another decline in oil prices.

President Dilma Rousseff narrowly won re-election by spending heavily and promising to extend the fight against poverty but she will need to restore order to public finances in her second term to get Brazil's stalled economy back in gear.

Asian equities rose on Monday, taking heart from upbeat earnings and economic data that eased recent global growth fears and sharpened risk appetite, while the dollar advanced to a three-week high against the yen.

The Brazilian real on Thursday slumped to a 9-1/2-year low while the Bovespa stock index erased its 2014 gains as investors feared President Dilma Rousseff may defeat market-favorite candidate Aecio Neves in Sunday's presidential election.

The Brazilian Army has expressed interest in buying a handful of Boeing Co (BA.N) CH-47 Chinook helicopters, the company said on Wednesday, saying that it continued to view Brazil as an important partner for defense and commercial projects.

Global equity markets fell on Monday as civil unrest in Hong Kong weighed on investor sentiment, while U.S. Treasury debt prices rose over uncertainty sparked by the protests.