Lula defends using Banco do Brics to circumvent the dollar in trade – 04/13/2023 – Market

President Lula defended, at the inauguration ceremony of Dilma Rousseff at Banco do Brics (New Development Bank, NDB) the expansion of trade in their own currencies by members of the institution.

“Why can’t we carry out trade backed by our currency? Who decided it was the dollar?”, he asked.

He admitted that “it is difficult, because there are people who are not used to it”, but it is also necessary not to rush the change, turning to Dilma and suggesting that she learn with “Chinese patience”.

He defended the NDB as an alternative to the IMF, so that international investments do not result in the transfer of policy command to developing countries.

It also upheld the right of countries to go into debt without the pressure they face today, in case of difficulty. “It is not possible to suffocate as they are doing with Argentina,” she said.

He again criticized the obstacles to expanding the power of emerging economies in the IMF and the World Bank and defended the expansion of the number of members of the NDB, stating that Dilma will give impetus to change.

In her speech, the institution’s new president defended the NDB as a “bank of the Global South”, aimed not only at member countries, but at all developing countries. She also emphasized expansion to this end.

And he added that he intends to expand the use of the members’ own currencies also for investments to be approved.

A day earlier, the bank appointed by China to carry out clearing in renminbi in the Brazilian market announced that it had carried out the first transaction in the Chinese currency.