This time, it is different. At least it is so far. When, in the past, the US financial markets sneezed, those in Brazil and elsewhere in Latin America caught a cold. When New York caught a cold, Latin America was laid low with pneumonia.

Brazil has not decoupled itself from the rest of the world: its stock market has fallen fairly much in line with other markets but, unlike in the past, the turmoil elsewhere has not been amplified.