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Brazil Daily Briefing

Saturday, 22 August 2026

📈 Brazil's iShares ETF surged 2.7% to 35.06 as XP Financial led with a 5.1% rally — LatAm risk appetite is back, and the Selic rate path is the next catalyst

Friday delivered Brazil's strongest session in weeks: the iShares MSCI Brazil ETF gained 2.69% to 35.06, the iShares Latin America 40 added 2.85% to 34.68, and even iShares MSCI Mexico advanced 2.49% to 77.38, confirming this is a regional EM re-rating rather than a single-country move. XP Financial (XP) led all names at +5.13% to $16.81, followed by SQM (+4.47%, $81.96), Bradesco (BBD +4.36% to $3.11 and BBDO +3.97% to $3.14), and Itaú Unibanco (ITUB, +4.32% to $7.48). Notably, there were zero losers among the top movers — a rare full-bid session that signals institutional conviction rather than retail momentum chasing. The dual engine driving the session is clear: domestic financials (XP, ITUB, BBD) pricing in BCB Selic rate cut expectations, while the commodity complex (SQM is a Chilean lithium miner but trades as an EM-commodities proxy) rides the global risk-on wave. Money Times reports the Bitcoin rally is rekindling broader EM crypto appetite, adding a second sentiment multiplier.

By the numbers

iShares MSCI BrazilEWZ

31.98

+0.69%(+0.22)

iShares Latin America 40ILF

32.14

+0.82%(+0.26)

iShares MSCI MexicoEWW

76.74

+0.89%(+0.68)

3 things that moved markets

Bitcoin Rally Rekindles the EM Crypto Market — What Specialists Are Recommending

Money Times reports that the ongoing Bitcoin rally is reigniting EM retail and institutional appetite for digital assets, with Brazilian market specialists recommending positioning in crypto-adjacent instruments ahead of the next Copom meeting. This matters for XP Financial — Brazil's leading investment platform — because crypto product fees represent a high-margin revenue stream that flows directly when digital asset volumes pick up. XP's +5.13% session today likely reflects both the rate-cut optionality embedded in the financial sector and the crypto-product margin uplift from renewed BTC momentum.

Read at Money Times ↗

WEG (WEGE3) and 4 Stocks to Beat the Ibovespa This Week

Terra Investimentos, via Money Times, names WEG (WEGE3) and four additional names as the week's highest-conviction Ibovespa-beating picks. WEG is Brazil's largest industrial electric motor manufacturer and a global exporter — its inclusion in an outperformance screen confirms the Brazilian market's industrial segment is being bought alongside the financial rally rather than as a defensive rotation. This breadth of institutional recommendation across financials (XP, ITUB), commodities (SQM proxy), and industrials (WEG) reinforces the full-market bull read.

Read at Money Times ↗

BrasilAgro (AGRO3): The 'Main Detractor' and What the Market Got Wrong

Money Times profiles BrasilAgro (AGRO3) — the agricultural real estate and farming company — examining why the stock underperformed recent sector consensus and what the CEO sees as the company's trajectory over the next ten years. BrasilAgro is a direct play on Brazil's agribusiness dominance (grains, soy, sugarcane) and the arcabouço fiscal (fiscal framework) stability that underpins long-term commodity export economics. The 'what the market got wrong' framing from management is typically a forward-looking buy signal when the underlying fundamentals are intact — a watchlist addition for EM value allocators.

Read at Money Times ↗

Top movers

Gainers (5)

Losers (5)

Sector heatmap

Smart-money note

When XP Financial (XP, +5.13%) and both Bradesco tickers (BBD/BBDO, ~+4.3%) rally simultaneously with ITUB (+4.32%), it is not factor-model coincidence — it is the market pricing a Selic rate cut at the upcoming Copom meeting. The BCB has been on a cutting cycle, and today's BRL stability alongside a 2.69% IBOV proxy gain implies FX confidence that the central bank can cut without triggering a currency selloff. SQM's +4.47% adds the commodity re-rating angle: Chile's lithium miner trading in tandem with Brazilian financials on the same day signals a pan-LatAm institutional flow — likely from EM funds reweighting into the region on DXY weakness (gold surged today per profitconfidential.com, consistent with a weaker USD backdrop). Risk for next week: if BRL strengthens through 5.40 vs USD, Petrobras and Vale's export revenues in real terms compress, creating a potential drag on the IBOV's commodity segment even as the financial sector holds its gains.

What to watch tomorrow

Selic / Copom timing

XP's +5.13% is a direct Copom rate-cut bet. Watch BCB communication next week — any signal of a pause or a slower cutting pace would unwind today's financial sector gains faster than they accumulated.

BRL / USD cross

A BRL rally through the 5.40 level (DXY weakness + EM risk-on) compresses Petrobras and Vale's USD export revenues when converted to reals. Monitor the FX-commodity cross before adding commodity names at today's levels.

Bitcoin EM correlation

Money Times flags Bitcoin momentum as a retail sentiment amplifier in Brazil. BTC-IBOV correlation tightens at risk-on peaks — if BTC pulls back sharply over the weekend, the crypto-adjacent financial names (XP) face gap-down risk at Monday's open.

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