RIO DE JANEIRO, March 4 — The Brazilian economy slowed in President Jair Bolsonaro’s first year in office, according to official data released today, disappointing news for markets that had bet on the far-right leader to engineer an economic take-off.

Brazil’s economy, the largest in Latin America, grew 1.1 per cent in 2019, down from 1.3 per cent in each of the previous two years, said the national statistics institute, IBGE.

Growth for the fourth quarter of the year came in at a lackluster 0.5 per cent.

Bolsonaro, who has been dubbed a "Tropical Trump,” took office on January 1, 2019, after storming to a shock election win in a Brazil fed up with corruption scandals and coming off a brutal recession.

The former army captain vowed to jump-start the economy with pro-market reforms, austerity cuts and privatizations, winning the support of the business sector.

Soon after he took office, analysts forecast economic growth of 2.5 per cent for the year.

The final figure came in at barely half that.

"It was a cold bath of reality,” said economist Victor Beyrute of consulting firm Guide Investimentos ahead of the figure’s release.

"Brazil is going through a transition period, and the problem can’t be solved in a year.” — AFP