By Jamie McGeever
BRASILIA (Reuters) - Brazil's President Jair Bolsonaro took to Twitter on Monday to emphasize the government's commitment to wide-ranging economic reforms, as a regular central bank survey of economists showed growth forecasts for this year slumping to a new low.
Bolsonaro, accused of failing to garner political support from lawmakers for his pension reform bill, tweeted that the government will put forward tax reform proposals as soon as pension reform, "the gateway to Brazil's progress," is passed.
"Approval paves the way for other economic steps that will benefit the whole country, like tax reform, which we intend to present soon after," Bolsonaro tweeted. Tax reform, he said, is a "pressing desire" for all Brazilians.
The president's tweets came just as the central bank published its latest weekly "FOCUS" survey of around 100 financial institutions, which showed the outlook for Brazil's economy at its bleakest so far this year.
The median forecast for gross domestic product expansion this year fell to a new low of 1.24% from 1.45% the week before. It was 1.95% only five weeks ago, and 2.55% in January.
That would suggest the economy will barely grow any faster than the 1.1% registered in each of the previous two years, a surprisingly shallow upturn following the devastating recession of 2015-16.
Deepening uncertainty surrounding the government's pension reform bill, which aims to generate 1.1237 trillion reais ($303 billion) of savings over the next decade, has weighed heavily on business and investor sentiment.
The real slumped on Friday to an eight-month low of 4.11 per dollar, and the Bovespa stock market fell 4.5% on the week. The real opened slightly stronger on Monday at 4.0850 per dollar.
The FOCUS survey on Monday also showed that economists lowered their end-2020 outlook for the central bank's benchmark Selic interest rate to 7.25% from 7.50% the week before.
The Selic rate is currently a record low 6.50%. Many economists argue that evaporating growth calls for even lower rates, but others say fragmented politics and uncertainty over reforms demand higher risk premia for investors.