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“To be able to use these AI solutions you really need highly technical physics doctorate types, you need to be willing to invest the money, and not just in what I’ve mentioned but in auditors, and compliance people who have a high level of math. Often people forget the compliance and the auditors, you can’t just have the regular ones because they haven’t been trained in that level of math,” says Valladares.

“Bolsonaro will have a hard time implementing his fiscal agenda,” agreed Mayra Rodriguez Valladares, a US economic consultant and specialist on Latin American politics at MRV Associates. She added that a steep drop this month in prices for oil — an important Brazilian export — coupled with a slowdown in top trading partner China created headwinds for Brazil’s economy. Longer-term goals, such as infrastructure and job training, are going largely ignored, she said.

“Mnuchin isn’t helping,” said Mayra Rodriguez Valladares, a former foreign-exchange analyst for the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. “For him to come out and explain what Trump is expressing is bizarre. It adds to the nervousness.” Rodriguez Valladares, who also conducts training for bankers and regulators through her consulting firm MRV Associates Inc., said the suggestion of Trump firing Powell is unprecedented. “This is really making us look like a very underdeveloped market where the president is telling the central bank what to do,” she said.

“This is a signal to all foreign exchange traders that they can go back to business as usual,” Mayra Rodriguez Valladares, a former foreign-exchange analyst for the New York Fed, said of the acquittal. “Not holding traders who manipulate rates accountable devalues the integrity of the foreign exchange market.”

“We know what happens when large parts of our diverse and massive financial system aren’t policed adequately,” Rodriguez Valladares said. “I’m sorry we’re heading back in that direction.”

“Rodríguez Valladares added that the U.S. banks are exposed to more indirect risks through its equity trading and foreign exchange businesses, adding that Chinese risks are prevalent in their U.S. business loans too. Domestic businesses that work with China through their supply chains may be harmed by the economic slowdown. “These interconnections shouldn’t be understated, and its hard to get a number because these interconnections are not so visible,” Rodríguez Valladares said.”