Brazilian Loan Gets Stocks Doing Samba

Stock proxies were pushing higher today, in no small part thanks to strength in financials, which were rallying following yesterday's approval of a $30 billion loan to Brazil by the International Monetary Fund.

As of 2:24 p.m. EDT, the Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 1.7% to 8601.18, the S&P 500 was higher by 2.1% to 895.1 and the Nasdaq Composite was higher by 1.5% to 1299.51. The Philadelphia Stock Exchange/KBW Bank Index, meanwhile, was up 4.5% paced by money center banks with (ta-da! ) big Latin America exposure, including Citigroup (C Quote), J.P. Morgan (JPM Quote) and Fleet Boston Financial (FBF Quote). Separately, Brazilian-based firms such as Brazil Telecom (BRP Quote) were among the day's biggest percentage gainers, lately up 16.1%.

"The IMF package means to dangle a big carrot in front of whomever the Brazilians choose to become President," said Mark Dow, who co-manages the $300 million (MEDIX Quote)MFS Emerging Market Debt fund for MFS Investment Management in Boston. "In the short-term it gives politicians like [Luiz Inacio Lulla da Silva and Ciro Gomes] an incentive to moderate their harsh rhetoric." ...