Reuters: US Dollar Report: UPDATE 1-Real weaker than 2/dlr helps Brazil industry -Mantega

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UPDATE 1-Real weaker than 2/dlr helps Brazil industry -Mantega Aug 6th 2012, 15:36 Mon Aug 6, 2012 11:36am EDT * Economic activity to pick up in Q3, Q4 -Mantega * Gov't to announce more measures in coming weeks * Brazil's real little changed against dollar SAO PAULO, Aug 6 (Reuters) - An exchange rate of more than 2 reais to the U.S. dollar lends competitiveness to Brazil's industrial sector, which will improve along with economic activity in the second half of the year, Finance Minister Guido Mantega said on Monday. The real has been stuck in a narrow range between 2.00 and 2.05 reais for over a month, in what traders call an informal trading band imposed by the central bank. Investors have focused keenly on signals from Brazil's government on whether officials remain comfortable with those levels. Mantega was in Sao Paulo to unveil a plan that frees up Brazil's states to spend more as a means to spur investments. Brazil will announce more stimulus measures to aid the country's struggling manufacturers in coming weeks, Mantega told reporters at the event. Brazil's industrial output edged up less than expected in June after three straight months of decline, though Mantega said last week that industrial production had reached "a turning point." Intent on reviving growth, President Dilma Rousseff's government has chopped benchmark interest rates to an all-time low of 8 percent, rolled out tax breaks, and vowed to step up government purchases of industrial goods. "Economic activity will improve in the third quarter and will be even better in the fourth," Mantega said. "It's the amount of time necessary for the series of measures we've taken to have an effect." At 12:28 p.m. (1528 GMT), Brazil's real was unchanged from the previous session at 2.0271 per U.S. dollar. Link this Share this Digg this Email Reprints

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