The Brazilian parliament has some similarity to the Australian at this point in time...no one can agree on anything. Hence any changes are unlikely. Current talk is around increasing royalties by 50 to 100% but also graduated for commodity price levels. They are more focussed on Iron ore than anything else. Current copper royalty rate is 2% so you can see it is actually a more friendly regime than Australia! Also, although the Brazilian economy is struggling, it would be erroneous to think that creates risk for miners. I actually believe (and the current evidence supports my belief) that the politicians get much more respectful of those companies that produce income for them in these circumstances....
Now different focus; will the current leftist government remain in power after the next election? Not so sure about that but it also is unlikely to impact AVB negatively. A year ago I would have said the biggest risk was rainfall and the consequent loss of generation ability for a country with extensive reliance on Hydro. However the falling oil price has ameliorated that risk to a large degree. Although some rain, at the right time would help keep our electricity costs down at sub 10c per kilowatt...
