We haven't looked at the state of play in local forex for a while, so let's remedy that now. Here's the evolution of the main traded currencies vs the USD over the past three months.
Biggest loser is the Chilean Peso (CLP), which lost at the time of the big 8.8mag quake and hasn't made back much ground since. Then comes Argentina's Peso (ARS) as it continues on its slow-but-sure drip drip deval that's been on the same track forever, it seems. Next is the local bigboy currency, the Brazilian Real (BRL) which also lost ground in February but has clawed back to R$1.75 to the greenback and in bascially UNCH for the period (fwiw, yesterday I saw a report of a big house calling for the Real to appreciate a further 10% by year's end, but hey...dumbasses in suits, right?).
Three currencies have strengthened against the USD in the last three months. Peru's Nuevo Sol (PEN) and Colombia's Peso (COP) are performing strongly enough (and the Peru Sol looks particularly good on the non-volatile stakes), but the winning coin is Mexico's Peso (MXN), coming back in the same style as its macro economy. Mexico got hard hit in 2009 thanks to its close ties with the US economy, but there are plenty of signals saying it will be LatAm's best performing economy in terms of YoY growth in 2010. We shall see on that.
Biggest loser is the Chilean Peso (CLP), which lost at the time of the big 8.8mag quake and hasn't made back much ground since. Then comes Argentina's Peso (ARS) as it continues on its slow-but-sure drip drip deval that's been on the same track forever, it seems. Next is the local bigboy currency, the Brazilian Real (BRL) which also lost ground in February but has clawed back to R$1.75 to the greenback and in bascially UNCH for the period (fwiw, yesterday I saw a report of a big house calling for the Real to appreciate a further 10% by year's end, but hey...dumbasses in suits, right?).Three currencies have strengthened against the USD in the last three months. Peru's Nuevo Sol (PEN) and Colombia's Peso (COP) are performing strongly enough (and the Peru Sol looks particularly good on the non-volatile stakes), but the winning coin is Mexico's Peso (MXN), coming back in the same style as its macro economy. Mexico got hard hit in 2009 thanks to its close ties with the US economy, but there are plenty of signals saying it will be LatAm's best performing economy in terms of YoY growth in 2010. We shall see on that.