Top line: Brazil recalled its ambassador from Buenos Aires after Milei called Lula a “convict” at a Bolsonaro rally in São Paulo — the deepest Argentina–Brazil rift since Mercosur’s founding — as Peru inaugurates Keiko Fujimori on Independence Day and a dense central-bank day runs from Brazil’s IPCA-15 to Chile’s evening decision.
Macro
- BrazilThe midday IPCA-15 is the day’s most tradeable release: consensus sees ~0.19% m/m with headline easing to 4.67% y/y, still far above the 3% target and with 2026 forecasts near 5.1%. Copom cut a third straight 25bp to a 14.25% Selic in June but dropped its easing guidance, and the World Bank now sees growth at just 1.6% for 2026. (Rio Times) (Rio Times)
- MexicoBanxico held at 6.50% in an unusual unanimous June vote, signalling a prolonged pause after headline inflation fell to 3.55% in the first half of June (core still sticky at 4.12%). The peso sits near 17.45 on a wide carry gap to a Fed parked at 3.75%, with Thursday’s Q2 GDP flash the next test. (Mexico News Daily) (Rio Times)
- ColombiaBanRep remains the region’s outlier hawk after raising the policy rate 75bp to 12% on 30 June; the board is inside its 25–31 July media blackout ahead of Friday’s decision. (Colombia One) (Banco de la República)
- LatAmCurrencies open firmer against a softer dollar — USD/BRL 5.117 (-0.64%), USD/CLP 939.85 (-0.95%), USD/MXN 17.451 — while Brent extends the unwind of its Red Sea risk premium to $86.43 (-2.2%), copper holds at $6.32 and the US 10-year sits at 4.64%. (Rio Times)
Financial & Insurance Markets
- LatAmThe 1 July renewal cleared decisively in buyers’ favour: property-cat excess-of-loss rates fell 15–20%, ceding commissions rose, and appetite migrated visibly into casualty, specialty and parametric structures as Bermuda, London and MGA capacity deepened the regional supply base. (Artemis) (Commercial Risk)
- LatAmGuy Carpenter’s global property-cat rate-on-line index fell 16% at mid-year, while 1H 2026 cat bond issuance reached US$15.8bn across 60 deals from 58 sponsors — a backdrop Fitch reads as a widening opening for Latin American ILS sponsors. (Guy Carpenter) (Artemis)
- VenezuelaVerisk now puts economic losses from the 24 June magnitude 7.2/7.5 doublet above US$10bn, but the insured share stays undetermined: penetration is minimal, cover is concentrated in commercial assets near Caracas, and sanctions plus currency distortion complicate adjustment. (Verisk) (The Insurer)
- BrazilIRB(Re) posted a Q1 2026 underwriting result of R$180m, up 74% year on year, with Brazil still its largest market at R$2.13bn of retained premium on a trailing-twelve-month basis. (Insurance Business)
Political
- ArgentinaBrazil recalled ambassador Julio Bitelli from Buenos Aires on Sunday after Milei, campaigning in São Paulo for Flávio Bolsonaro, called Lula a “convict” and the government “thieving socialists” — the worst diplomatic crisis between Mercosur’s two largest members in years. (MercoPress) (Buenos Aires Times)
- PeruKeiko Fujimori is inaugurated today, Independence Day, becoming the first woman elected to Peru’s presidency after a 49,641-vote runoff win; regional leaders and Spain’s King Felipe VI attend, while protests are called in Lima for 27–29 July. (MercoPress) (Rio Times)
- BrazilLula’s reply was a dismissive “Who is that guy?”, keeping the temperature down ten weeks before the 4 October general election, with presidential and gubernatorial runoffs set for 25 October. (MercoPress) (AS/COA)
- ColombiaPresident-elect de la Espriella’s alliance took its first legislative defeat, an early sign he lacks a reliable congressional majority ahead of his 7 August handover, even as Bogotá and Washington agreed a joint security push branded Plan Patriota 2.0. (Latin America Risk Report)
Regulatory
- ChileThe Banco Central de Chile board decides at 18:00, with consensus firmly on a hold at 4.5% despite sticky services inflation and a soft peso — a bellwether for how Andean peers frame their own cut paths. (Rio Times) (Banco Central de Chile)
- ColombiaBanRep’s communication blackout runs 25–31 July; the rate decision lands Friday, the monetary policy report on 4 August and its presentation two business days later. (Banco de la República)
- LatAmPrudential regimes across Brazil, Mexico, Chile, Colombia and Peru continue converging on risk-based, Solvency II-inspired capital, steadily raising the capital and reporting bar for local cedants and reinsurance branches. (Skadden)
- MexicoThe USMCA review remains the dominant policy risk on Banxico’s horizon and the main channel through which trade uncertainty feeds Mexican credit, construction and cargo exposures. (Rio Times)
El Niño / Climate & Nat Cat
- LatAmThe tropical Pacific is in moderate El Niño conditions and strengthening. NOAA’s CPC gave an 82% chance of emergence in May–July and 96% odds of El Niño persisting through December–February 2026-27, and forecasters expect it to dominate tropical circulation at the peak of the Atlantic season. (NOAA CPC) (weather.com)
- ChileThe live nat cat event: days of El Niño-driven storms have flooded the north, killing at least 13, isolating more than 63,000 people and prompting disaster-zone declarations in Coquimbo and Huasco province in Atacama, with gusts to 160 km/h and collapsed water systems. No insured-loss estimate has been published yet. (teleSUR)
- CaribbeanColorado State’s July update puts 2026 Atlantic ACE at roughly 40–45% of the long-term average with well below-normal US and Caribbean major-hurricane landfall odds, and NOAA sees a 55% chance of a below-normal season; just one named storm had formed through early July. (CSU) (Artemis)
- Central AmericaAgricultural drought risk is concentrated in the Dry Corridor, Colombia, Venezuela, Cuba, the Dominican Republic and Haiti, with forecasts pointing to a 70% probability of below-normal rainfall and maize, rice and coffee most exposed. (FAO) (WLRN)
- CaribbeanCCRIF SPC entered the season with coverage up 9% to US$1.57bn and new members, leaving the parametric pool larger and still untriggered year to date even as wind risk skews lower and excess-rainfall and drought triggers become the likelier activations this year. ([Artemis, Jun 2026])
Coming Up
- 28 JulBrazilIPCA-15 mid-month inflation at noon, seen easing to 0.19% m/m and 4.67% y/y.
- 28 JulChileBanco Central de Chile rate decision at 18:00; consensus hold at 4.5%.
- 29 JulUnited StatesFed decision, expected hold at 3.75%, setting the carry backdrop for LAC currencies.
- 30 JulMexicoINEGI flash estimate of Q2 GDP, the first clean read on post-tariff momentum.
- 31 JulColombiaBanRep rate decision after June’s 75bp hike to 12%.
On the Radar
- ArgentinaThe Milei–Lula rupture ten weeks before Brazil’s vote puts Mercosur coordination, cross-border programme placement and regional trade flows into a far more politicised setting than at any point since the bloc’s founding.
- VenezuelaLoss development on the June quake doublet is the region’s key uncertainty: a >US$10bn economic loss with an unquantified insured share, where sanctions and FX distortion make adjustment slow and could still surprise facultative and treaty writers with commercial exposure around Caracas.
- LatAmRates falling 15–20% into a season forecast to be quiet is a classic soft-market setup; the exposure actually rising this year — drought, excess rainfall, E-Pacific activity, agricultural and parametric triggers — is the one being priced with the least discipline.