Latin America

Peru     Lessons learned? Investors will be looking closely at the assets behind Peru’s mortgage-backed securities. While most global markets are seeking to shield themselves from shockwaves emanating from the US subprime home loan and residential mortgage-backed securities (RMBS) ...

Nicaragua     Guevara: Deal will put an end to lawsuits. When Nicaragua offered commercial creditors a 95.5% haircut on $1.4 billion in commercial debt as part of a workout, the deal appeared to be more of a scalping. Yet ...

Brazil       Mantega: Hiking other taxes will make up for shortfall.       With Brazilian legislators scrapping the country’s financial transactions tax (CPMF) in December, the government says it must now plug a 40 billion real ($22 ...

COMPANY TO WATCH: COPA HOLDINGS/PANAMA       Panama, a natural transportation hub with its famous canal, has become an air-transport center for the Americas, thanks to its national flag carrier, Copa Airlines. The fast-growing airline with a young fleet ...

BRAZIL       The good times roll: Brazil's economy provides plenty of reasons to celebrate. Brazil-focused hedge funds continued to outperform other emerging market funds, producing an average 5.11% return in October, for a hefty 29.47% year-to-date (YTD) gain. ...

COUNTRY REPORT / BRAZIL Brazil’s commitment to developing biofuels is paying off handsomely. Investment is flooding in to other areas of the economy, too.   José Sergio Gabrielli, CEO of Petrobras For the administration of Brazilian president Luiz Inácio Lula ...

BRAZIL     São Paulo stock exchange Bovespa Holding, which owns the São Paulo stock exchange, raised nearly $3.7 billion in an IPO that ranks as Latin America’s largest offering this year. Bovespa sold 250 million shares on October 26, ...

ECUADOR       Correa: Clamping down on the oil industry After a 15-year absence, Ecuador has rejoined OPEC in a move president Rafael Correa says will allow his country to gain greater access to technical advice and market information. ...

  DR NEWS     Grupo Clarín, Argentina’s largest media conglomerate, listed its depositary shares on the London Stock Exchange last month, making it the first company based in Argentina to have a DR listing on the exchange. The global ...

  Gol: Planning share buyback   Investment banks say the recent US Fed rate cut, coupled with strong domestic fundamentals, bodes well for Brazilian capital market investors. “Fed easing since mid-August has opened up a new leg of the bull ...

VENEZUELA     Rodrigo Cabezas: New currency will help fight inflation. Venezuela is gearing up for the introduction of a new currency to replace the bolivar, in circulation since 1879, in a move the Hugo Chávez administration hopes will help ...

LATIN AMERICA     Lipsky: Sounds a warning. When the meltdown in US subprime mortgages triggered forecasts of a possible US recession, unleashing global credit and money market volatility, Latin America proved to be relatively insulated from the debacle. Though ...

JAMAICA     Golding: Ambitious economic plans. Newly sworn-in Jamaican prime minister Bruce Golding is seeking ways to kick-start the island’s sluggish economy and tackle mounting social pressures over escalating unemployment and crime rates (his own forecasts predict 1,300 murders ...

COUNTRY REPORT / BRAZIL     Buffeted by the shockwaves from the US subprime mortgage crisis, Brazil has to steer a steady course if it is to keep its economic development on track.     Buffeted by the shockwaves from ...

COLOMBIA     Ecopetrol's Cartagena oil refinery. The Colombian energy sector entered a new investor-friendly era with the late-August IPO of Ecopetrol, the state-owned oil company. Ecopetrol is Colombia’s largest corporation, with income of around $18 billion in 2006. The ...

BRAZIL Some 50% of respondents to a Merrill Lynch emerging market investor survey in August said they were bullish on Brazil. Reaching a similar conclusion, rival Morgan Stanley predicts Brazilian markets will see further upside, despite recent US market turbulence, ...

Argentina       Double act: Nestor Kirchner and the presidential hopeful, Mrs. K. Argentine First Lady and senator Cristina Fernández de Kirchner is poised to replace her husband, President Nestor Kirchner, in the top post in the October 28 ...

Brazil     Brazil’s strong capital markets recovery and IPO blitz has prompted international investment banks to put the country back on their radars. Lehman Brothers, which exited Brazil in 2003 amid a near market collapse, has reopened its São ...

Corporate financing news / global equity/drs     Latin American equity capital markets had their biggest month ever in July, with $9.6 billion in proceeds from 23 issues, an increase of 48% from the previous record of $6.5 billion set ...

Latin America     There is no longer any doubt that Venezuelan president Hugo Chávez’s “Bolivarian Revolution” is having a significant economic and political impact on Latin America. The question now is, Will it last? It’s 11 o’clock in the ...