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Key View

• As we expected, the US House of Representatives approved USD95bn in foreign aid on April 20 including USD60.7bn in aid for Ukraine (31.8% of GDP).
• The resumption of US military aid should provide Ukraine with just enough materiel to defend itself, but its forces will still lack resource volumes required to contest the battlefield

Key View

• The Alliance for Regional Production and Innovation proposed by Brazil is poised to strengthen the country's pharmaceutical market growth, supporting the projected rise in pharmaceutical sales.
• This initiative, which aligns with Brazil's economic and healthcare strategies, is expected to drive domestic innovation and production

Key View:

• Qatar's LNG production capacity expansions being driven by a robust global LNG demand growth outlook.
• Europe's struggle to reduce dependence on Russian gas offers significant opportunities for Qatar to expand its LNG production capacities.
• Competition between the US and Qatar for a greater share of Europe's LNG market is

Key View:

• We believe that the low productivity of cocoa plantations in West Africa and the long-term structural factors weighing on production in the region represent an upside risk for Latin American cocoa producers. 
• We forecast that cocoa production in Ecuador will increase over the medium to long term and we expect increased investment

Key View

• We expect that Botswana’s current account surplus will widen to 1.1% of GDP in 2024, from an estimated 0.4% in 2023. 
• Recovering global demand for diamonds will provide tailwinds to exports in 2024, prompting a widening of the trade surplus.
• Risks to Botswana’s external position will remain limited given robust reserves and

Key View: We hold a positive outlook for Croatia's consumer activity over 2024, with support for spending and confidence coming from a strengthening economic backdrop, easing inflation and jobs and earnings growth. Consumer confidence has been improving steadily over the last few months of 2023 and with inflation easing over the same period

We retain our mixed short-term outlook for the currencies that we cover in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region. All of the MENA currencies we track closely have weakened so far this year, albeit to different degrees (see chart below). 

In Israel, the ongoing war in Gaza and rising tensions with Iran led to a nearly 5.0%

Please Note: BMI is enhancing its risk analysis with a new scoring system following its acquisition of GeoQuant, a market-leading provider of political risk data. From March 27 2024, risk scores are inverted: zero now represents the lowest risk and 100 represents the highest risk. This allows for clearer, industry-standard assessments. For

Latest Development: Smart Communications (Smart), a subsidiary of incumbent, Philippines-based operator PLDT, has initiated a campaign to boost eSIM adoption among prepaid customers, offering current Smart subscribers an upgrade to eSIM for PHP99 (USD1.75) while retaining their number, and providing non-Smart users the option to switch to Smart

Key View

• The limited nature of Israel’s retaliation against Iran on April 18/19, and Iran’s muted response, suggest that both sides are seeking to de-escalate tensions, which is now the likeliest scenario.
• Indeed, the reaction in oil markets was muted, and oil price futures are already declining. If Israel and Iran remain on this de