|
Brazilian and Latin American equities climbed, alongside gains in U.S. stocks on increased merger activity and reportedly high voter turnout rates for Iraq's weekend election.
Separately, Standard & Poor's upgraded Mexico to its "core holding" in Latin America, while lowering Brazil to a smaller overweight.
Still, overall it recommends selling Latin American stocks if the recent rebound continues, commenting that the "better mood" in the region's equities "is likely to be followed by new weakness."
Brazil's benchmark Bovespa Index surged 401.41 points, or 1.67%, while Mexico's benchmark Bolsa Index rose 56.59 points, or 0.43%. Argentina's Merval Index fell 8.13 points, or 0.59%.
Brazilian shares rose, aided by strong results from the country's leading retail bank. On the earnings front, Banco Bradesco reported that its net profits climbed 48% to 1.058 billion reais in the fourth quarter from the year-ago period.
The company's chief executive attributed the result to "the expansion of both quantity and quality of the loans portfolio agreements with retail chains, customer growth, and growth of the economy."
Full-year 2004 net profits advanced 33% to 3.060 billion reais from 2003. Bradesco's stock advanced.
Also, Brazilian national oil company Petrobras, U.S.-based Occidental Petroleum and Australia's Woodside Petroleum were awarded offshore exploration and production blocks Saturday in Libya's first licensing round since international sanctions were lifted, according to a source at the awards ceremony in Tripoli.
Amid other individual stock movement, shares of government-run electric power utility Eletrobrás experienced the rebound some analysts had forecast following a recent sell-off, as a senior government official indicated the firm is healthy and prepared to invest in 2005.
Separately, Mexican issues advanced to a record closing high, powered by strength in U.S. equities.
Additionally, Standard & Poor's raised its call on Mexican sovereign debt one notch to "BBB." On the economic front, with the U.S. Federal Reserve projected to raise the federal funds rate at Wednesday's meeting, further monetary tightening is expected in Mexico.
In its comments last Friday, Mexico's central bank maintained its stance that local interest rates should continue to reflect tighter monetary conditions in the U.S.
Bank of Mexico Governor Guillermo Ortiz said he foresees core inflation remaining at its current level around 3.8% for several months, before beginning to decline.
He said the bank expects inflation measured by the Consumer Price Index to decline in 2005 to within the bank's 2% to 4% target range.
In deal news, conglomerate Alfa SA said that its auto parts unit Nemak has purchased the German concern Rautenbach. Alfa did not disclose the financial terms of the acquisition, which it said will strengthen Nemak's presence in the European market. Alfa rose on the session.
Also, Mexican home construction firm Desarrolladora Homex SA announced that it sold over 21,000 homes in 2004 and foresees increasing that number to at least 27,000 this year. Homex surged.
Elsewhere, Argentina's market slipped, beginning an important week for the country's debt restructuring with a return to weak volumes. On Friday, the government concludes a three-week preferential period for small bondholders.
While this deadline had initially been viewed as a key one for investors, who continue to await significant new developments on acceptance rates, analysts now believe that equities could continue sideways movement until closer to the end of the offer period.
According to an Argentine Economy Ministry statement, approximately 26.6% of eligible defaulted bonds had been tendered in Argentina's US$ 103 billion debt restructuring as of Friday.
The statement is part of a weekly filing that the Argentine government is required to make with Italian securities regulator Consob, the Italian stock exchange and three Italian-based newswires on the progress of its six-week exchange.
Thomson Financial Corporate Group
www.thomsonfinancial.com
PRNewswire
 |
Subscribe to this comment's feed
Brazil received a huge boost in its international image with its selection as the host of the 2016 Olympics, but it was really just the cherry on top of the overall recognition of the country's ascension to the ranks of one of the world's most important countries. Now, as it finally takes its place on the world scene, there has been a great deal of concern about what kind of image Brazil hopes to project, now that the world is really paying attention. 
The only good thing to say about the visit to Brazil of Iran's president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, on Monday November 23, is that it was mercifully short and lasted less than 24 hours. Ahmadinejad had his picture taken being hugged by president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva who gave him a warm welcome and said Iran had every right to develop nuclear energy for peaceful purposes. 
The small, coastal town of Condé is located just a twenty minute's drive from João Pessoa, the capital of Paraíba. The Northeast of Brazil has historically been a place of encounter and mixing between peoples. For millenia groups of indigenous people fished, farmed, migrated and sometimes fought along this large, fertile area. 
The Brazilian diplo-MÁ-cia (bad diplomacy) carries on its accelerated course towards the non-acknowledgment of human rights, although sometimes it takes pleasure in saying that it does precisely the opposite. The visit of Iran's president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, is another example of a diplomatic omission that verges on hypocrisy. 
On July 4, 2006, representatives of Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay and Uruguay met in Caracas to sign the protocol for the entrance of Venezuela into the Southern Common Market (Mercosur). After two and a half years, the protocol was approved by the legislative bodies of Argentina and Uruguay, and as of now it may be only days away from being ratified by the continent's economic megalith, Brazil. 
Some sectors of the fight against AIDS have suggested that Thabo Mbeki, the former president of South Africa, committed genocide through his absence from the fight against the illness in his country throughout his two terms. 
One hundred and eleven years after Brazil abolished slavery, the number of workers deprived of their freedom is still huge. They raise cattle, produce charcoal, sugar cane or timber. Some of them, most undocumented Bolivians, work in basements of small apparel factories in São Paulo and other metropolis. 
On November 7, 2009 a few friends and I had an opportunity to take a look inside a Brazilian jail outside the city of Rio de Janeiro. We were able to take some amateur footage of our experience on video (see link below). It's no surprise, of course, that the typical Brazilian jail lacks some of the functionality of those in North America or Europe, but our experience that day was quite shocking. 
Depletion of the Amazon Rainforest is not a new concern facing environmentalists, biologists, ecologists, and a growing number of the Amazonian indigenous peoples. For decades they have feared for the fate of the world's most biologically diverse and species-rich hothouse. 
Geisy Arruda made history this week in Brazil, but for all the wrong reasons. What began as a poorly planned fashion statement has become a worldwide tale. Geisy decided to wear a pink mini-dress to her private college in São Paulo state, and after that, all hell broke loose.