JAIR BOLSONARO, Brazil’s president, likes romantic metaphors. “Our marriage is stronger than ever,” he said in May, after the press speculated that he was at odds with the economy minister, Paulo Guedes. “The marriage ended with no hard feelings,” he said this month after sacking Carlos Alberto dos Santos Cruz, a minister who had said that others in government should be more careful on social media—thus outraging Bolsonaro fans who tweet about the virtues of military rule and the horrors of homosexuality.

When Mr Bolsonaro took office in January investors thought he might let Mr Guedes, a free marketeer, reform the unaffordable pensions system, liberalise the economy and restore robust growth. Scandals, and the president’s rocky relationships with congress and his own deputies, have spoilt that mood. In mid-May Mr Bolsonaro forwarded an opinion article to his WhatsApp contacts saying that congress was making Brazil “ungovernable”. For the first time more Brazilians disapproved of his government than supported it. The currency, the real, reached an eight-month low. Rumours of impending impeachment spread. June brought the resignation of the respected director of the state development bank, Joaquim Levy, and leaks that embarrassed the justice minister, Sérgio Moro. “The government is a crisis factory,” said Rodrigo Maia, the business-friendly president of the lower house of congress.