The Decline and Fall of Brazil's Cruzado

Abstract

On 28 February 1986, the Brazilian government announced a “heterodox” inflation stabilization program that rapidly came to be called the Plano Cruzado. It was intended to halt an inflation that appeared to be escaping control and untamable through orthodox stabilization policies. Although at first the Plano Cruzado seemed to succeed dramatically in eliminating inflation without recessionary side effects, it failed by the end of 1986, as inflation revived, external accounts collapsed, and real growth sagged.