Brazilian stocks slump 15% in 2013

Brazil's Sao Paulo Stock Exchange (Bovespa) index closed at 51,508 points Monday, representing a 15.5-percent fall in 2013. According to local media, Bovespa was up 0.47 percent in the last session of the year, but accumulated a fall of 1.86 percent for December. The extremely poor performance of Brazil's stock market -- one of the world's worst for this year -- is partly attributed to the collapse of EBX group, owned by Eike Batista, Brazil's once-richest man and the seventh richest in the world. Batista's flagship oil and gas company OGX filed for bankruptcy protection in late October. OGX's problems soon spilt over to other companies of the group and in November, EBX's naval company OSX filed for bankruptcy protection as well. Meanwhile, common stocks in Brazi's largest state-run company, Petrobras, rose 0.5 percent to 15.99 reais (6.78 U.S. dollars) Monday, but accumulated an 18.2 percent drop for the year. The company's preferred stocks rose 0.89 percent Monday, reaching 17.08 reais (7.25 dollars), but fell 12.5 percent in 2013. The Brazilian real also slumped this year. The real-dollar exchange rate dropped from 2.048 in January to 2.356 Monday, which means the Brazilian currency devaluated 15 percent against the dollar, the sharpest fall since 2008.