Media and LatAm Navel Gaze: August 21, 2017
Both sides and beyond. Almost a week later and still tough to make complete sense of Charlottesville with the fire and fury once reserved for North Korean now seen coming from the White House in its apparent defense of the President’s racially charged statements. Vice reporting made a strong visual statement from the POV of the white supremacists that seemed to get some of the largest number of remarks while President Obama received the most likes for his tweet quoting Nelson Mandela, a welcome anti-hatred pause amid the social-media swirl. The Boston rally was calm in comparison, drawing huge crowds.
Elsewhere:
- The presidents two economic councils disbanded in protest to Trump’s response to Charlottesville;
- No big surprise but big news nonetheless, strategic White House advisor Steve Bannon is out in an almost “mission accomplished” stance and now heads to do more of the same at Brietbart;
- Confederate statues are also being dismantled in other cities, the reason for the Charlottesville rally to begin with;
- Mourners continued to pay respect in Spain following a deadly car attack in Barcelona, killing 13 and injuring scores;
- Wells Fargo named board member Elizabeth Duke its chariman, the first woman to hold the role at such a large bank;
- Apple is gunning for original content, with a $1 billion budget earmarked to procure or produce original programming; and
- The total eclipse of the sun on Monday is expected to drain some $700 million in US productivity due to sun gazing; view protected;
- Jerry Lewis died; and
- Tina Fey ate cake.
LatAm Gaze:
- On Monday, Argentina’s stocks rose, the peso strengthened more than 3% and credit default swaps fell after the mid-term legislative primary election was seen to favor business-friendly President Mauricio Macri's reform effort.
- The Brazilian government has delayed the announcement of its budget targets for 2017 and 2018, which were previously expected for Monday, as authorities struggled to estimate revenues given strong opposition in Congress to tax hikes.
- On Thursday, BHP Billiton approved a US$2.46 billion investment plan to extend the life of the Spence copper mine in northern Chile for more than 50 years with a projection of up to 5,000 new jobs and an increase in production from 2021 onwards.
- The president of the Dominican Association of Exporters (Adoexpo), Álvaro Sousa, intends to turn the Dominican Republic into the "Caribbean Supermarket,” by increasing its exports to the Caribbean.
- In Mexico, FEMSA's convenience store chain, Oxxo achieved sales of 39.66 billion pesos, making it the second largest revenue retailer in the country after Walmart who maintained 109 thousand 424 million pesos worth of sales.
- Mexico’s, Pemex has created an initiative that will give a 'bond of exchange' of up to 200 thousand pesos to employers that migrate to individual pension schemes before December of this year.
- End of Week Market Updates
- Merval (Argentina): +6.26%
- Bovespa (Brazil): +2.01%
- IPSA (Chile): +1.65%
- IGBC (Colombia): +1.20%
- IPC (Mexico): +0.85%
- BVL (Peru): + 2.12%
