The purpose of this paper is to assess the performance of the Bank of Brazil (BB) in the 2001-2006 period, with a focus on the following aspects: has the BB actually performed the role of a typical public bank, functioning as an important instrument to foster development in Brazil? Or, instead, has its recent path been characterised by the reinforcement of a private logic of behaviour? The paper aims at raising a few questions regarding the role of the state in the economic activity, particularly the role that a big state-owned bank can and must perform to finance development in a peripheral (and unequal) country like Brazil. The general conclusion is that, since the mid-80s, the BB has increasingly lost the key function that it formerly exerted as a public bank. A distinct pattern of behaviour has emerged, characterised by the bank's transformation into a "more private, less public" institution.
bank of Brazil; state-owned banks; public sector; financial system; banking regulation
