Brazil needs to vigorously pursue stronger trade ties with the European Union if it is to retain the special trading perks it currently enjoys with the merchants of Europe.

The World Trade Organization has upgraded Brazil’s economic status by classifying it as an upper-middle-income economy. Such a reclassification generally entails a nation shifting its position from being a recipient of international aid and benefits, to being a potential donor. In the case of Brazil’s relations with the EU, the economic status reclassification cuts the Latin American country off from preferential trading perks with its longtime transatlantic companion.

But Brazil still needs those trading benefits; it still needs trade with the EU, and it needs that trading relationship to grow even stronger.

Pursuit of stronger trade ties with the EU through a free trade agreement is how Brazil can retain EU trade preferences.

In an interview with the Financial Times, Brazil’s Foreign Minister Antonio Patriota expressed his nation’s plans to forge ahead with a deal with the EU apart from the oft-divided Latin American trade bloc Mercosur, of which it’s a member. While Brazil still intends to cooperate with Mercosur, Patriota hopes that “each [Mercosur] country may be able to negotiate [with the EU] at separate speeds.” Former head of the Brazilian central bank Arminio Fraga concurred: “It’s good to get on with your neighbors, but the rest of the world is doing trade deals and Brazil risks getting left out.”

Brazil is Latin America’s largest economy, contributing 37 percent of the EU’s trade with Latin America. It is the single biggest exporter of agricultural products to the EU. The European Union is the biggest foreign investor in Brazil, accounting for about half of Brazil’s foreign direct investment.

These latest trade overtures by Brazil will strengthen the bond that already exists between Europe and Brazil and may encourage other Latin American countries to follow suit. That Euro-Latino bond goes all the way back to the Holy Roman Empire during the 16th century, under Charles v. More recently, it goes back to the industrial partnerships formed by underground Nazis toward the end of World War ii.

With the aid of the common Catholic religion, this bond is indicated by Bible prophecy to wax stronger into an economic partnership of merchants—the “merchants of the earth”—who will supersede Anglo-America, and call the shots in world commerce (Revelation 18:2-3; Ezekiel 27:15, 22).

Watch this trend of increasing trade relations between the EU and Brazil and much of Latin America. It proves the veracity of the prophecies about the leading global powers of the end time and how they soon will be replaced by God’s Kingdom on Earth. For more on this subject, read our article “Europe’s Latin Assault.” That article details the recent history of Europe’s intricate and intimate relationship with Latin America, its implications for our future, and the decades-old warnings we have sounded about it.