|
Latin American markets mostly declined on the day, as investors continued their trend from yesterday of booking profits, following broad-based gains early in the week. Brazil tumbled, while Mexico was little changed.
Dampening investor sentiment was a sharp drop in U.S. shares amid rising oil prices and disappointing July same-store sales results. Investors are also preparing for tomorrow's release of the U.S. employment report.
Brazil's benchmark Bovespa Index tumbled 244.17 points, or 0.91%, while Mexico's benchmark Bolsa Index edged down 3.74 points, or 0.03%. Argentina's Merval Index jumped 18.62 points, or 1.23%.
Brazilian shares continued to give back some of the impressive gains earned earlier in the week. Concerns regarding the latest developments in the alleged cash-for-votes scandal also hit the market.
Congressman Roberto Jefferson, who initially brought about allegations tying the governing Workers' Party to the bribery scandal, provided further congressional testimony today; although, no new revelations came to light.
In other news, Standard & Poor's said that the country's ongoing political scandal is preventing the credit rating agency from upgrading Brazil's sovereign credit rating.
In earnings headlines, TAM said that higher fuel costs led the airline to post second-quarter earnings before interest, tax, depreciation, amortization and aircraft rental costs of 170.9 Brazilian reais, down from 201.3 million reais in the corresponding period a year ago.
The firm also swung to a net loss of 24.7 million reais, compared to a profit of 206.5 million reais last year. The year-ago figure was bolstered by a gain in aircraft leasing arrangements. Without the gain, the firm would have lost 26.6 million reais. Also, net revenue leapt to 1.246 billion reais from 992.9 million reais in the corresponding quarter a year ago.
Elsewhere, Ultrapar posted a 20% decline in its second-quarter net profit to 89 million reais from 112 million reais a year ago, as the petrochemicals holding firm was hit with high interest rates and the appreciation of the real. Ultrapar's net revenues rose to 1.20 billion reais from 1.19 billion reais, while EBITDA slipped to 165 million reais from 194 million reais.
Mexican shares ended little changed, as traders digested a recent string of highs for the country's key index. Also, U.S. markets tumbled due to rising crude oil prices and a mixed bag of retail sales results. Mexico exports the vast majority of its goods to the U.S.
Last night, the Mexican Miners' and Metalworkers' Union said that about 4,000 workers will go on strike on August 12 at Grupo Mexico's five mining and refinery facilities in northern Sonora. The strike could last up to two days if the workers demands for pay and bonus rises are not met.
Argentina recuperated today, regaining some of what was lost during yesterday's session. Amid the latest financial releases, natural gas pipeline operator TGS posted a second-quarter net profit of 63.8 million pesos, reversing a year-earlier loss of 52.6 million pesos, thanks to favorable foreign exchange rates.
Net sales edged down to 234.4 million pesos from 234.6 million pesos last year, while operating profit declined to 110.7 million pesos from 121.2 million pesos.
Elsewhere in Latin America, Chile's consumer prices advanced 0.6% in July, compared to the 0.3% uptick seen in June. The robust reading fed speculation of a rate hike next week.
Thomson Financial Corporate Group - www.thomsonfinancial.com
 |
Subscribe to this comment's feed
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. 
The push of vigilante groups in Rio de Janeiro's favelas (shantytowns) in the last three years is the most important and alarming information of the just-released study by the Rio de Janeiro University's Violence Research Center (Nupev-Uerj). 
A dispute over drug trafficking territory in Rio de Janeiro has intensified lately, leaving in its wake unprecedented acts of violence, such as the downing of a police helicopter in the northern zone of the city on October 17. Three policemen died and another two were injured. This event has drawn the attention of the international media, who are raising the issue of public security for the 2016 Olympics to be held in Rio.