Latin American financial markets

Harvey Arbeláez and Reid Click. 2005. Latin American Financial Markets: Developments in Financial Innovations (Vol. 5). Amsterdam: Elsevier JAI. 445 pages. ISBN: 0‐7623‐1163‐0.     

The new Latin American landscape

For decades, Latin America has been accumulating a social liability of considerable proportions. Precariousness in education and health, food insecurity in a large stratum below the poverty line, violence, unemployment, and unlawfulness sharpen the incorrigible skepticism of opinion makers. Nevertheless, Latin America is an immense territory of possibilities to be exploited with independence, pragmatism, and proper vision of the future. The most promising news is that the region as a whole, despite insufficient progress in the smallest and poorest countries, is very close to meeting the targets in the fight against hunger. The greatest regional challenge is to harmonize economic expansion and the social profit that it represents. © 2008 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

How to Monitor Competitive Advertising

Marketing managers are becoming increasingly aware of the benefits from structured and continuous monitoring of competitor advertising activity. To know quickly and accurately how much competitors are spending on their media advertising and how they are utilizing their budgets can be of profound help to marketing management, advertising agency planners and creative teams. Systematic monitoring can signal moves made by competitors—introducing new products or product modifications, special offers, new strategies and approaches to markets not previously covered. Of interest to the analyst are innovations in competitor strategies.     

Advertising Strategies and Information Content in American and Swedish Advertising

Technological developments make it easier and easier for marketers to standardize their marketing programmes worldwide. There are, however, also strong forces against such a development in advertising, and a standardized advertising approach across countries could hardly be recommended at this point. This article explores the differences between American and Swedish advertising in terms of advertising strategies used, as well as of how informative they are. The result shows that there are fairly large differences between American and Swedish advertising.     

Towards the Latin American Regiocentric Corporation

Abstract

Globalization and regionalism are emerging with force in Latin America and a new breed of Latin American corporations is making its mark in response to this new reality. These corporations are exploiting technology, low costs, and their in-depth understanding of the region's intricate cultural fabric to compete with global firms and become regional players in niches neglected by these powerful rivals. Using the integration-responsiveness framework, this paper describes the evolution and characteristics of regional strategies in selected Latin American companies and speculates on the potential reversal of these strategies as Latin American economies attempt to insulate themselves from the recent international financial crisis.     

Sales promotion for Latin American products

After the United States Western Europe is Latin America’s biggest export market — a market full of opportunities and yet fraught with many difficulties. Sales chances here for Latin America are determined partly by the kind of products It can offer and partly by its marketing operations. It is proposed in the following to begin with an outline of the present sales situation and future prospects on the German market — by far the most important for Latin American products in Europe.     

Chinese Investment in Latin American Resources

China's need for vast amounts of minerals to sustain its high economic growth rate has increasingly turned Chinese investors towards Latin America.This demand has propelled China into third place among Latin American investors,directing over $15 billion (about 9     

Latin American Universities and Technology Commercialization

A small but significant percentage of the discoveries made by university researchers have commercial value, especially in fields such as the biomedical sciences, material science, and information technology. Early stage technologies emerging from university labs represent an important source of innovation for technology firms in the United States (US), especially those located in close proximity to elite universities in regions characterized by high levels of entrepreneurial dynamism. Based in part on the U.S. demonstration effect, policymakers in the developing world increasingly view universities as institutions capable of accelerating technology-based economic development. In this article we examine the efforts of elite universities in Chile, Mexico, and Brazil to transfer faculty inventions to the marketplace. On average these institutions have upgraded commercialization infrastructure since the mid-2000s and a select few are beginning to generate significant licensing revenue and viable spinoffs. We conclude with policy recommendations and suggestions for future research.     

International competition in Latin American telecommunications markets

Current market liberalization and reforms in Latin America are attracting a great deal of interest by global telecommunications companies and investors. This article focuses on recent liberalizations and reforms in the telecommunications markets of Chile, Argentina, Mexico, and Venezuela. The article reviews the winning bids for these markets 'and analyzes the strategic alliances of investors, global telecommunications companies, and local investors. The article concludes with an analysis of the experience to date in opening Latin American telecommunication markets to free competition and speculates on future developments in this sector. © 1993 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.     

Herd Behavior in Latin American Stock Markets

ABSTRACT

This article investigates the presence of herd behavior in Latin American stock markets using the methodologies proposed by Christie and Huang (1995 Christie , W. G. , &; Huang , R. D. ( 1995 ). Following the pied piper: Do individual returns herd around the market? Financial Analysts Journal , 51 ( 4 ), 31 – 37 .[Taylor &; Francis Online] , [Google Scholar]) and Chang, Cheng, and Khorana (2000 Chang , E. C. , Cheng , J. W. , &; Khorana , A. ( 2000 ). An examination of herd behavior in equity markets: An international perspective . Journal of Banking and Finance , 24 ( 10 ), 1651 – 1679 .[Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]). Daily closing prices and trading volumes from January 3, 2000 to September 15, 2010 from the stock markets of Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Mexico, and the United States were analyzed. The US market was studied in order to provide a reference for comparison. The shares for which data was collected in each country were those listed in the most representative stock index for each market. It was not possible to establish evidence of herd behavior in any of the five countries studied using the Christie and Huang (1995 Christie , W. G. , &; Huang , R. D. ( 1995 ). Following the pied piper: Do individual returns herd around the market? Financial Analysts Journal , 51 ( 4 ), 31 – 37 .[Taylor &; Francis Online] , [Google Scholar]) method. However, evaluating the data for the entire period using the method proposed by Chang, Cheng, and Khorana (2000 Chang , E. C. , Cheng , J. W. , &; Khorana , A. ( 2000 ). An examination of herd behavior in equity markets: An international perspective . Journal of Banking and Finance , 24 ( 10 ), 1651 – 1679 .[Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]) we detected herd behavior in the Chilean market. These results were not affected by the addition of additional exogenous variables representing the September 11 attacks of 2001 and the subprime crisis, or when the effect of the behavior of US shares on other countries was analyzed. Asymmetric herd behavior was detected in the Chilean, United States, Argentinean, and Mexican markets.     

A Latin American Perspective on Trade Policies

This article looks at the trade policy guidelines that the region should follow in order to achieve dynamic international economic linkages, in the light of the international context, the theoretical debates on this subject, and some lessons that may be learned from the study of successful cases. It is posited that in the countries of the region, trade policy can be an instrument for macroeconomic management, fiscal management, and, at the microeconomic level, resource allocation. Its use as a second-best instrument is justified when there are constraints on the use of the best possible solutions. It is also held that there must be close coordination of the policies applied in the fields of trade, industry, and technology to ensure high levels of investment in the tradeable sectors of the economy, a form of competitiveness based on constant increases in productivity, and an improvement in the region's specialization profile. Finally, emphasis is placed on the need to strengthen the institutions of Latin American states in order to ensure that their interventions in the economy have a suitable level of effectiveness.     

Nuevo Latino: Rebranding Latin American Cuisine

Nuevo Latino Cuisine invites diners to experience the vertigo of consuming a reinvented version of traditional Latin American food while enjoying a cosmopolitan atmosphere at sophisticated restaurants. Using “border thinking” and critical ethnography, this paper discusses how the restaurant industry in the US reproduces colonial desire by aestheticizing and commodifying traditional meals. This article assesses the rebranding of Latin American Cuisine as a fashionable consumer trend where identity, class, and cultural representations are resignified through consumption practices. The central issue guiding this research consists of identifying the rationales and strategies used by the restaurant industry when rebranding Latin American cuisine. Understanding Nuevo Latino at the intersection of hybrid cultural forms, cosmopolitanism, and the power structures of market forces in late capitalistic societies is fundamental to assessing the colonization of lifeworlds by the economic system, which imposes an alternative process of subjection and subjectivation through consumption.