Copom (Brazil's rate committee)

The Monetary Policy Committee of the Central Bank of Brazil. It meets the president and directors of the BC eight times a year to decide the Selic rate, the economy's basic interest rate.

The decision is made late in the afternoon of the second day of the meeting, and the minutes, which explain the reasoning, are published the following Tuesday. Higher interest rates make credit more expensive, hold back inflation and tend to weigh on the stock market; cuts do the opposite.