Isn't it strange how people vent anger by demonizing a whole country? Anyway, that slight non-seq aside, here's a couple of snippets from the land of the Muffin:1) The new mining law has passed its first reading. It now spends a week in committee before going to the second debate. If it passes debate two (which should happen before the end of December, but relax and smell flowers if it doesn't happen til January, yeah?) then it just needs the Congresillo rubber-stamps and its a done deal. Were you warned and did you have the time to take advantage? Yes you were. The good news is that there's plenty more to come. If you want a copy of the 3mega 88 page Spanish language PDF that was debated in the assembly, send me a mail; I don't see why I should be the only one to suffer ;-)
2) Correa isn't dropping the dollar. Bloomie (via Stephan Kueffner, who along with Alonso Soto at Reuters Ecuador does a good job in covering the country) notes in a Radio MUFN soundbite yesterday, Correa said, "It would be stupidity to drop the dollar under these circumstances."
Where does that leave Alberto Ramos of Goldman Sachs and his "I would not make a bet that we will have dollarization in three to five years?". Well, it just highlights what a hedged and non-commital statement it was in the first place. Certainly far more wishy-washy than the screaming "Ecuador May Be Forced to Scrap Dollar After Default" headline slapped on top of the story. The authors? Oh wow! Lester "ring the usual suspects" Pimentel and Matthew "balance is for suckers" Walter. Tell 'em what they want to hear, boyz........
PS: thanks once again to reader DMMwatcher, who is keeping tabs on the mining law's passage far more closely than me and gave the headsup about the first passage yesterday afternoon. He shows me up as the slacker that I am, but I'm grateful all the same :-). And with a handle like his he's probably be a bit richer after this week's market action, too :-)