It comes down to one question: Are the oil fields in Colombia, a country rich in oil assets, worth the investment to exploit them? Many industry executives are asking themselves that question these days-and the answer may well be no.A source at Shell Colombia SA, speaking off the record, told LatinFinance that the multinational company […]
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Debt Doldrums
Nineteen ninety seven was a bumper year for Latin America’s syndicated loan market with volumes reaching close to $59 billion. That’s an impressive figure considering it even topped new Latin bond issuance last year. Indeed, not since before the debt debacle of the 1980s has the region seen such frenzied enthusiasm for commercial bank lending. […]
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Domestic Rifts
The Baianos would say simply that they have more mandinga in the northeastern Brazilian state of Bahia than their amigos in the southern state of Rio Grande do Sul. Mandinga is a type of mystical power, almost voodoo, and Bahia, with its mixture of African gods and Southern European superstitions, pulsates with the weird magic. […]
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Embraer Corporate Profile
Soon after Mauricio Botelho took over as CEO of Brazil’s Embraer in September 1995, he hung a photograph of an airplane in the lobby of the corporate office in São Jose dos Campos, about 50 miles outside of São Paulo. For an aircraft maker to have a photo of a plane hanging in its lobby […]
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Fair Play
JC Penney, the US retail giant, sparked Brazil’s first shareholder revolt last December when it bought control of Lojas Renner, a listed department store chain. The terms it offered the non-controlling investors to buy up their shares were so harsh that shareholders-who included some of Brazil’s most influential financiers and fund managers-demanded that the country’s […]
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Greasing the Beast
Henri Philippe Reichstul emerged in March from nearly a decade in obscurity as a São Paulo investment banker to take on one of the most challenging and visible jobs in Brazilian business when President Fernando Henrique Cardoso appointed him to lead the national oil company Petroleo Brasileiro SA, known as Petrobrás. Reichstul’s biggest task is […]
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Informed Investors
Informed InvestorsWhen CompaÒÌa de Telecomunicaciones de Chile SA (CTC) became the first Latin American company to post an equity listing on the New York Stock Exchange in July 1990, the firm opened itself up to a new and previously unknown investor base. Its listing of American depositary receipts also gave rise to a variety of […]
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One Step Back, Two Steps Forward
A Newsweek correspondent years ago once described Brazil as having a rather “willy nilly” character. The nation’s status at any particular moment may be precisely what is willed by elected officials, the financial community and the people at large, or in fact could be the opposite. In a country as large, as politically divergent and […]
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Review of 1997
Review of 1997Economic reforms in Argentina over the past few years have led to fast economic growth-a process that was interrupted in 1995 by a crisis in confidence fueled by Mexico’s currency devaluation in December 1994. But when economic agents realized that the convertibility system and economic reforms could be maintained, and that Argentine macroeconomic […]
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Riding out the storm
It seems as if Brazil’s capital markets are fending off attacks on all fronts these days. A recession at home and investor aversion to risky emerging markets are taking their toll. Meanwhile, an adverse tax regime, dwindling liquidity and a rash of companies leaving the stock exchange are sapping the confidence of markets and investors. […]