Blue Dollar 
Latin America and the Caribbean, the region where the coronavirus caused the worst economic destruction and more than a quarter of the world’s deaths, is now falling victim to a slow inoculation campaign. Political fights and production bottlenecks are stymieing Brazil’s vaccination efforts. Mexico is struggling to source doses as its death toll surpasses India’s. … Read more
Brazil’s far-right president, Jair Bolsonaro, appointed an Army reserve general to lead state-owned energy giant Petrobras, after criticising several successive increases in the price of fuel. “The government decided to appoint Joaquim Silva e Luna to fulfill a new mission, as… president of Petrobras, after closing the cycle, exceeding two years, of the current president … Read more
Argentine banks took a beating last year, and the nation’s biggest lender says the industry is at risk of a repeat performance. While bad loans and government regulations were the main culprits in 2020, rising inflation will be added to the list this year, according to Fabián Kon, chief executive officer of Banco Galicia, Argentina’s … Read more
After delaying 14 months (largely due to the coronavirus pandemic but also procrastination), the Alberto Fernández presidency is now poised to deliver on its campaign promise of multi-sector (although not multi-party) negotiations aiming at a macro-economic consensus based on a wage-price agreement. Optimists hope that this might produce something approximating the plan demanded by the … Read more
Nicolás Aguzin, the head of JP Morgan’s international private banking division, will be the Hong Kong Stock Exchange’s new chief executive, the bourse announced Tuesday. The Argentine-born banker will take up his post in May, at a time when Beijing is clashing with Western powers over its campaign to stamp out dissent in the financial … Read more
Argentina’s state-owned oil company, YPF SA, said Thursday it had swapped almost 60 percent of a key bond due in March, saving the company millions of dollars in debt payments and avoiding a costly default next month. Holders of a total 59.8 percent of a US$ 413-million bond due in March said they would exchange … Read more
The global climate crisis has made the debate about the ways food is produced and consumed around the world ever more urgent, with agribusiness at its centre. In response, agroecology – a method that replaces chemical pesticides with bio-inputs and genetically-modified seeds with organic equivalents – has expanded in countries such as Argentina. In 2016, … Read more
Carlos Menem, the former president whose economic policies quashed hyperinflation during the 1990s but sowed the seeds for what became the largest debt default in history, has died. He was 90. Local newspaper La Nación reported Menem’s death. He had been in frail health for some time. Menem will lie in state in the Senate until … Read more
The coronavirus pandemic will set back the participation of Latin American women in the labour market by a decade, according to a United Nations report published on Wednesday. The rate of women in employment in the region dropped from 52 percent in 2019 to 46 percent in 2020, said the assessment by the UN Economic … Read more
Congress on Thursday passed almost unanimously a new law making parliamentary approval mandatory before signing any debt agreements, including with the International Monetary Fund (IMF), with whom the government is currently renegotiating the payment of major loan. The bill, already approved by the Senate last November, was only opposed by the two FIT leftist deputies … Read more