Economy & Business - March 2025

The return to power of Donald Trump in the US has raised concerns over the impact that the volatile leader’s drive to deport illegal migrants and ramp up border security could have on remittances in Mexico, where they represent the largest single source of foreign income.... Read More

During the last general elections in Ecuador in mid-2023 the world was shocked by the assassination of presidential candidate Fernando Villavicencio and the raw violence that had taken hold of the small Andean nation.... Read More

One tense moment in an awkward cabinet meeting that was broadcast live on 4 February and led to several ministers resigning was when President Gustavo Petro grilled his then energy and mining minister, Andrés Camacho (2023-2025), as to why state oil company Ecopetrol had extended a joint fracking venture with US firm Occidental Petroleum Corporation.... Read More

Peru’s transport and communications ministry (MTC) announced in February that it will be launching a call for tender for a pre-investment study into the 900km-long Chancay-Pucallpa railway project.... Read More

In February Bolivia’s President Luis Arce inaugurated the country’s first steel production plant, the Complejo Siderúrgico del Mutún, located in Puerto Suárez in the eastern department of Santa Cruz.... Read More

PERU | Chancay-Shanghai trade. In the first two months of operation, over 22,000 tonnes of cargo have been transported along the new direct maritime route between the Chinese-funded Chancay mega-port on the Peruvian Pacific coast, and the Chinese city of Shanghai, according to a report from Peru’s state news agency Andina on 5 March.... Read More

Judging by Yamandú Orsi’s first week in office as Uruguay’s new president, he is well under way to meeting at least one of his campaign promises, that of not rocking the boat and pursuing “safe change”.... Read More

With the possible exception of former president Carlos Menem (1989-1999), no Argentine leader has had a closer relationship with Washington than the country’s current head of state, Javier Milei.... Read More

In recent years Chile’s all-important copper industry seemed to have lost steam, while all the attention was on the promising lithium potential in the Andes [EB-24-07].... Read More

If all goes as expected, Brazil may only have two major airlines by early next year.... Read More

Latin America’s largest company is not one of the big Brazilian names like Petrobras or Itaú Unibanco, nor Mexico’s América Móvil.... Read More

BRAZIL | Vale invests in Amazon-based operations.... Read More

Panama must invest in education and job quality to increase productivity, reduce poverty and inequality, and boost long-term growth, according to a new report from the World Bank (WB).... Read More

On 18 February President Rodrigo Chaves vetoed a bill that aims to improve connectivity between Costa Rica and its Central American neighbours by reducing the price of low-cost flights.... Read More

Alistair Routledge, president of US oil giant ExxonMobil Guyana, said in February that, together with partners US firm Hess and China’s China National Offshore Oil Corporation (CNOOC), his company had requested environmental permits to develop Longtail, its eighth offshore oil and gas project in the country.... Read More

In late January the International Monetary Fund (IMF) published a report following the conclusion of an Article IV consultation with Grenada, revealing that despite the damage caused by Hurricane Beryl last July – equivalent to around 16% of GDP – growth has been holding up well with GDP expected to expand by 3.9% in 2025.... Read More

Not unusually, Jamaican politicians cannot agree on what is happening in the local economy.... Read More

GUATEMALA | Port expansion.... Read More

When Bloomberg reported on 10 February that US oil refineries had been “snubbing” Mexico’s crude oil shipments, President Claudia Sheinbaum and the CEO of the state-run oil company Pemex, Víctor Rodríguez Padilla, were forced to publicly recognise that there was a problem of excess salt and water in Mexican crude oil.... Read More

Mexico’s President Claudia Sheinbaum is aiming to make the country the fifth most visited in the world by 2030 as part of her Plan México economic plan [EB-25-02], building on recent strong performance in the sector. ... Read More

MEXICO | Record FDI in 2024.... Read More