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Strategies & Market Trends : Telebras (TBH) & Brazil -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: md1derful who wrote (15378)	5/18/1999 9:17:00 PM
From: wl9839	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 22640

Brazil Civil Servants Still Hamper Fiscal Efforts Dow Jones Newswires BRASILIA -- An avalanche of lawsuits has, temporarily, exempted 75% of Brazil's 1.1 million federal civil servants from newly-increased social security taxes in May, a source at the Budget Ministry told Dow Jones Newswires Tuesday. The figure is up from 44% of federal workers who had received favorable rulings from courts as of last week. The lawsuits and court rulings, which are preliminary and may be appealed by the government, are threatening one of the government's most important austerity measures. The increased taxation is a piece of a broad 30 billion reals ($1=BRR1.665) fiscal-squeeze plan that underpinned a $41.5 billion international aid package for Brazil to pull the country from the verge of economic collapse. The new social-security taxes, okayed by Congress last January, were expected to trim the burgeoning deficit of Brazil's public-sector pension system by BRR2.8 billion in 1999. The federal system gap totaled BRR18 billion in 1997, according to the latest official data available. A total 823,511 federal civil servants, based in 16 of Brazil's 27 states, have obtained preliminary injunctions banning the increased bite in their paychecks. They allege the new tax rate - hiked up to 25% from 11%, depending on salary - is so high it can be termed a confiscation. The government has said it will appeal the court rulings. The Budget Ministry sources said that the lawsuits delayed the closing of May's federal payroll to later this week, from last Wednesday. Only then will the government will be able to determine the impact the legal dispute has on its books. -By Adriana Arai; (5561) 321-1224; aarai@ap.org

To: md1derful who wrote (15378)	5/19/1999 12:32:00 AM
From: Steve Fancy	Respond to of 22640

Welcome back Doc, glad you had a good trip. Look forward to your bio-tech thoughts. If you cleared out your UBB the other day at 29 something, looks like you called the top, for now anyway....good job. I'd like to think I'm in my OCT calls till 36 or buyout, whichever happens first. Thinking of picking up a few more, but a little nervous past this week. IDTC, in the end Hawaii seems to have pegged the story pretty darn accurately, and I'm impressed with a couple of the names. Could be pretty big if the world wakes up to internet telephony again. Playing this one by ear. Please let me know your thoughts as the story unfolds. sf