Business cycles fluctuations and commodities prices: Evidence for Brazil

Abstract

This paper aims at evaluating macroeconomic impacts of commodities prices’ shocks on the Brazilian economy during the 2000s. The econometric methodologies employed allowed to identify three regimes of high and three of low behavior in those prices, all of them presenting the expected effects of stimulating the level of activities, at times when external price shocks are favorable; and the reverse, when price shocks were negative. The decomposition exercises made it possible to isolate the effects of commodities shocks from the other potential determinants of the level of activities. Thus, it was possible to verify that in the most recent upward cycle, starting in 2016, the recovery in commodities prices has not been able to compensate for the other domestic (or external) factors that, for the moment, block a more robust economic recovery.