Nine months after recording its first coronavirus case, Uruguay is seeing an outbreak in what President Luis Lacalle Pou has called the “first wave,” threatening to undo the hard-fought gains throughout the pandemic. The government is taking a heavier-handed approach to beat back infections including tighter border restrictions and a bill sent to Congress seeking … Read more

Britain and the European Union signed a post-Brexit trade deal on Wednesday, setting their seal on a drawn-out divorce just hours before the United Kingdom brings its half-century European experiment to an end. EU chiefs Ursula von der Leyen and Charles Michel, the heads of the European Commission and European Council, smiled at a brief televised … Read more

Maize climbed to US$ 5 a bushel and soybeans rallied for a sixth day, driving both crops to fresh six-year highs, as farmer protests and dry weather in South America threaten to further tighten supplies. Grain markets surged in the past month on adverse weather and as some nations moved to restrict exports to ensure … Read more

A ban on maize exports in Argentina is fanning fear among farmers and traders that one of the world’s top food suppliers is returning to an era of brutal meddling in crop markets. The measure creates yet another driver for surging global grain futures, given Argentina is the third-largest shipper of maize, and stokes concern … Read more

Agricultural producers in Argentina began a three-day strike on Monday in rejection of the government’s move to suspend maize exports for the next two months. The so-called ‘paro agrario’ went ahead despite a last-minute intervention from the government, which lifted the block and replaced it with a daily sales cap on corn exports as the … Read more

Argentina’s peso, the world’s weakest currency for the past two years, has nowhere to go but down as the nation struggles to rein in runaway consumer price increases, according to the currency’s most accurate forecaster in 2019’s fourth quarter. “We see the peso at some point depreciating and catching up with a persistently high inflation … Read more

The Economy Ministry on Monday announced new measures to reduce the pressures on volatile currency markets and ward off devaluation, basically by bolstering the alternatives other than the official exchange rate to a surging “blue” parallel dollar. The main innovation overturns mid-September capital controls imposed by the Central Bank to cut the so-called “parking” interval … Read more

The past few weeks have been the best for the Alberto Fernández administration in quite some time, giving the embattled president and his Cabinet a little breathing room. They better not pat themselves on the back just yet though, as this relative calm is not destined to last. As usual in Argentina, the value of … Read more

For the bravest, most risk-tolerant investors out there – shops like Franklin Templeton and Pimco – the Argentine trade the past few years was to dive into the local market and scoop up peso-denominated bonds. Paying out interest rates of up to 75 percent, it was a cash-generating machine. But now, amid a collapse that has … Read more

Argentina’s infamous “blue” dollar picked up pace again on Friday, rising a further seven pesos to hit a new record of 178 pesos, 129 percent ahead of the official exchange rate. Amid continued financial uncertainty the parallel, black market exchange rate had remained quiet until midweek before climbing four pesos on Thursday with hardly anybody … Read more