Brazilian Central Bank's withdrawals surpass deposits in January

RIO DE JANEIRO, Feb. 5 (Chinese media) -- Brazil's Central

Bank announced on Thursday that withdrawals surpassed deposits by 486 million

reais (211.3 million U.S. dollars) in the country's savings accounts in January.

It was down from a positive balance of 5.3 billion

reais (2.3 billion U.S. dollars) last December and 1.1 billion reais (478

million U.S. dollars) in January last year.

It was the first time withdrawals had surpassed

deposits since October 2008.

The results were attributed to the impacts of the

internationalfinancial crisis. Last year, the crisis led to a 47 percent drop in

the total balance of Brazilians' saving accounts compared with 2007.

According to the bank, withdrawals totaled 77.5

billion reais (33.7 billion U.S. dollars) in January, down from 96.6 billion

reais (42 billion U.S. dollars) last December and 101.8 billion reais (44.2

billion U.S. dollars) in January 2008.

Deposits totaled 77 billion reais (33.47 billion U.S.

dollars) in January, down from 101.9 billion reais (44.3 billion U.S. dollars)

last December and 103 billion reais (44.7 billion U.S. dollars) in January 2008.

The total volume of the Brazilians' savings accounts

totaled 271.6 billion reais (118 billion U.S. dollars) in January, up 270.4

billion reais (117.5 billion U.S. dollars) from last December. The interest in

the savings accounts totaled 1.6 billionreais (695 million U.S. dollars) in

January, roughly the same amount registered last December.