Brazil to keep key interest rate at 14.25%

Brasília (AFP) - Brazil's central bank is expected to maintain its key interest rate at 14.25 percent this Wednesday after seven consecutive hikes aimed at holding back soaring inflation. A weekly Central Bank survey of 100 economists on Tuesday said that further raising the rate would not help Brazil's steep economic slowdown. The world's seventh biggest economy is in a recession predicted to extend through 2016 and previous rate rises have not prevented a steady rise in inflation to the