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Opinion
John Authers

Brazil Hits a Wall and Takes Latin America With It

The coronavirus has exposed weak leadership in Brazil and Mexico and disturbed economic fault lines, upending two decades of relative stability.

Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro’s response to the pandemic has not inspired confidence.

Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro’s response to the pandemic has not inspired confidence.

Photographer: Sergio Lima/AFP/Getty Images
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Brazil’s president Jair Bolsonaro has just led his country, and indeed all of Latin America, to the end of a long cycle.

Almost two decades ago, the election of Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva — a union leader perceived as an extreme left-winger — to Brazil’s top job created one of the biggest buying opportunities in recent financial history. Having collapsed at first as investors took fright, the country’s stock market went into orbit, growing at more than two-thirds per year from Lula’s election in 2002 until the global financial crisis in 2008. For years after that, it continued to outpace the U.S. S&P 500 Index.