[27 June 2014, Washington Post] By Peter Robison, David Biller and Christiana Sciaudone:  No, Steve Jobs declared. Apple wouldn’t put a store in Brazil, with its “crazy” and “super-high” taxation. That was 2010, and Jobs was writing, bluntly, to an official in Rio de Janeiro.  Four years later, Jobs’s successor had a different message for Brazilians.“‘Obrigado’ to everyone who visited our new store,” CEO Tim Cook tweeted in February, after 1,700 people packed into a Rio mall for the opening of the first Apple store in Latin America.

“We are Brazilians, with lots of pride and lots of love,” his blue-shirted employees sang, adapting a tune heard in stadiums and bars when the national soccer team plays.Apple is one of many foreign brands feeling the love for Brazil — even if Brazilians, mired in an economic slump, aren’t. As the country hosts this year’s World Cup and prepares for the Olympic Games in 2016, the optimism that led it to bid for the planet’s two most famous sporting events has all but evaporated.

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