Quick answer
FXMacroData serves 9 Brazilian real series from the production catalogue: the Selic target set by the Copom, the daily CDI rate, IPCA inflation, producer prices, GDP, PNAD unemployment, retail sales, international reserves and the BIS trade-weighted index. The sources are the Banco Central do Brasil (BCB), the statistics institute IBGE and the Bank for International Settlements.
It is a focused set built around what drives USD/BRL: the Selic path, inflation against the 3 percent target and the activity data that shape Copom guidance. Every release carries its announcement timestamp, including Copom decisions published after the São Paulo close.
This guide explains each BRL series, who publishes it, when it is released in Brasília time and UTC, and how traders use it in USD/BRL and BRL carry trades.
Who publishes Brazilian real data
Banco Central do Brasil. The BCB's Monetary Policy Committee (Copom) sets the Selic target eight times a year. The BCB also publishes the CDI interbank rate and international reserves through its SGS time-series system, which is where FXMacroData reads them.
IBGE (Instituto Brasileiro de Geografia e Estatística). IBGE publishes the IPCA consumer price index, which is the index used for Brazil's inflation target, the IPP producer price index, the quarterly national accounts, the PNAD Contínua household survey that produces the unemployment rate, and the PMC monthly retail survey. FXMacroData reads these from IBGE's SIDRA tables.
Bank for International Settlements. The BRL trade-weighted index is the BIS nominal effective exchange rate (broad basket, 2020=100).
Each observation is stored with the publisher's series identifier and an announcement_datetime. New releases typically reach the API within seconds of official publication; see release speed for measured timings.
BRL indicators covered
These are the series listed in the production catalogue at /v1/data_catalogue/brl, grouped by theme. The slug in brackets is the indicator value in API calls.
Policy and rates
- Selic target (Meta Selic) (
policy_rate): the Copom's annual target rate, one row per decision since 1999. The rowdateis the day the new rate takes effect, which is the day after the evening announcement;announcement_datetimecarries the announcement itself. Brazil's double-digit policy rate is the reason BRL is a core carry currency. - CDI (
risk_free_rate): the daily interbank deposit rate (BCB SGS series 12). It is served as a per-business-day rate, not an annual one: to compare it with the Selic, annualise it over 252 business days as ((1 + daily/100)^252 - 1) x 100.
Inflation
- IPCA inflation (
inflation): the 12-month change in the IPCA, with history back to 1980. Brazil runs a continuous 3 percent target with a 1.5 percentage-point tolerance band, so the distance between IPCA and 4.5 percent is what the market watches. - Producer Price Index (IPP) (
ppi): IBGE's industrial producer price index for mining and manufacturing, available from 2014 on the current 2018=100 base. Earlier readings on the retired base are not spliced in.
Growth and activity
- GDP (
gdp): quarterly GDP in BRL billion from the national accounts, back to 1996. - Retail sales (PMC) (
retail_sales): the month-on-month change in retail sales volume, a direct read on household demand and the credit cycle.
Labour market
- Unemployment rate (PNAD Contínua) (
unemployment): the monthly rate from IBGE's continuous household survey, published on a rolling three-month basis and available from 2012.
External and reserves
- International reserves (
foreign_reserves): the BCB's liquidity-concept reserve total, served in USD billion. Brazil's large reserve stock is the first line of defence in BRL sell-offs and funds the BCB's spot and swap interventions. - Trade-weighted index (BIS NEER) (
trade_weighted_index): monthly nominal effective exchange rate, which separates BRL-specific moves from broad US dollar moves.
BRL release timing
IBGE releases at 09:00 Brasília time, before the B3 cash equity open. Copom decisions are announced in the evening, after the 18:30 statement time, once domestic markets have closed. Brazil has not used daylight saving since 2019, so Brasília time (America/Sao_Paulo) is UTC-3 all year and the UTC times below do not shift.
| Release | Publisher | Local time | UTC | Typical schedule |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Copom Selic decision | BCB | From 18:30 | From 21:30 | 8 meetings a year, decision on the Wednesday; new rate effective the next day |
| IPCA inflation | IBGE | 09:00 | 12:00 | Monthly, around the 10th of the following month |
| PNAD unemployment | IBGE | 09:00 | 12:00 | Monthly, near the end of the following month |
| Retail sales (PMC) | IBGE | 09:00 | 12:00 | Monthly, mid-month, about six weeks after the reference month |
| Producer prices (IPP) | IBGE | 09:00 | 12:00 | Monthly, about a month after the reference month |
| GDP | IBGE | 09:00 | 12:00 | Quarterly, about two months after quarter end |
| International reserves | BCB | Varies | Varies | Monthly, near the end of the following month |
| CDI | BCB | End of day | End of day | Every business day |
Because Copom announces after the close, the first liquid reaction to a Selic surprise is in USD/BRL offshore trading and then in the São Paulo open the next morning. The release calendar lists each upcoming Copom and IBGE date in your own time zone, and Copom statements appear in the BRL press release feed.
Worked example: the September 2026 Copom decision
At its September 2026 meeting the Copom cut the Selic target by 25 basis points. This request returns the decision:
curl -H "X-API-Key: YOUR_API_KEY" "https://api.fxmacrodata.com/v1/announcements/brl/policy_rate?start_date=2026-09-01"The newest row in the response (abridged to the core fields):
{
"date": "2026-09-17",
"val": 13.75,
"announcement_datetime": 1789594320,
"previous_value": 14.0,
"previous_date": "2026-08-06"
}val is the new Selic target of 13.75 percent, down from 14.00 percent. The date of 17 September 2026 is when the new rate took effect, while announcement_datetime 1789594320 is 21:32:00 UTC on Wednesday 16 September 2026, or 18:32 in Brasília: the moment the decision was published. A model that used date as the event time would be almost a full day late, which is why the timestamp field matters for event studies on USD/BRL.
How traders use BRL data
Carry and the real Selic
BRL is traded for yield. Subtract the 12-month IPCA from the Selic target to get the ex-post real policy rate; Brazil's real policy rate has been high by international standards, and that is what attracts carry inflows. Compare that real rate with the US and Japan to judge how much cushion a long BRL position has.
IPCA against the target band
With a continuous 3 percent target and a 4.5 percent upper bound, each IPCA print is read for whether it brings inflation back inside the band. Prints above the ceiling push Copom towards a longer hold or tighter guidance; prints moving towards 3 percent open room for cuts, which narrows carry.
Decision-time event studies
Because Copom decisions are published after the close, measure the reaction from announcement_datetime to the next São Paulo session rather than intraday. Compare the size of the change with the previous decision (previous_value) to classify each meeting as a hold, a step or a change of pace.
CDI as the funding curve
The daily CDI, annualised, is the rate onshore investors actually earn. When CDI trades away from the Selic target it signals liquidity conditions, and its level sets the hurdle for USD/BRL forward points.
Reserves and risk-off
Monthly reserves show how much firepower the BCB has to intervene. Combine them with the BIS trade-weighted index: a broad BRL sell-off with stable reserves is a market move, while falling reserves suggest the central bank is leaning against it.
