📊 The new Lulameter

Forget Polymarket or Kalshi. There is another way to gauge the market's expectations for President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva's re-election odds: how analysts read Brazil's benchmark inflation index, the IPCA.

For 15 straight weeks, the median forecast in the Focus survey — the Central Bank's weekly poll of economists — has pushed year-end inflation higher. The 2026 projection has climbed from 4.06% in early January to 5.33% by June 19, with 2027 and 2028 drifting up alongside it. Strip out the volatile items and the picture holds: core forecasts rose 0.8 percentage points for 2026 and 0.45 for 2027. Most of the headline jumps sit in …

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