El Salvador

El Salvador's stock market grew 66 % at the end of 2023

 February 16, 2024

Negotiations in the securities market reported an increase of 66.4% in 2023 with a traded amount that reached $4,817.4 million, according to the Superintendence of the Financial System (SSF).

The last bulletin published by the institution indicates that the repo market had one of the highest increases between 2022 and 2023, going from $1,049.5 million to $1,917.7 million, with an increase of 82.7%.

This was followed by the primary fixed and variable income sector, which went from $848.6 million in 2022 to $1,520.3 million for 2023, equivalent to a growth of 79.2%.

The SSF assures that both the secondary and stock markets reported a 25.7% and 36.4% decrease in the amounts traded in the last year.
A record.
The executive director of the El Salvador Stock Exchange (BVES), Valentín Arrieta, described 2023 as a record year for the stock market. The dynamism was linked, in part, to the upward trend of the primary market, investment certificates, securitization and closed-end investment funds.

The BVES spokesman recalled that the securitization figure dates back more than 13 years, and since then more than $2,000 million have been placed in the primary market through this tool. Last year alone, more than $243 million were placed in this sector, led by vertical projects, shopping centers and corporate developments.

Argentina

Javier Milei will eliminate by decree trust funds for USD 2 billion

 February 16, 2024

President Javier Milei decided to eliminate "some trust funds that represent half a point of the GDP", announced this Friday the presidential spokesman Manuel Adorni. This removal represents some u$s2,000 million. "We appeal to politics to understand that transparency is above all else", he launched in his press conference at Casa Rosada.

According to the spokesman, these funds "lack transparency and represent half a point of the product, around u$s2,000 million". "We are going to put an end to these funds," Adorni said.

In televised statements made this week, the libertarian president revealed the strategy of legislating by decree after the failure of the omnibus law. Within this framework, trusts or trust funds would be one of the main objectives: "Have no doubt. I am going to put an end to all the black boxes in politics".

The Bases project, which did not pass the filter of the Chamber of Deputies and which resulted in the withdrawal and return to commissions of the regulation, granted Milei the possibility of "transforming, modifying, unifying or eliminating specific allocations, trusts or public trust funds created by norms with legal rank, including those destined to subsidies, reviewing their origin and destination to achieve greater rationality, efficiency, effectiveness, transparency and control of the use of public resources".

Seven measures are proposed to generate dollars

 February 16, 2024

In view of the shortage of dollars in the domestic market, seven short-term measures are proposed to generate U.S. currency, which is putting the industrial sector and the entire national productive apparatus on edge. The liberalization of exports, the elimination of the Financial Transaction Tax, the streamlining of procedures at the Foreign Trade Single Window and at the National Agricultural Health and Food Safety Service, allowing the free sale of foreign currency in the parallel market, the approval of foreign credits and the issuance of bonds.
The domestic market is facing a critical situation due to the lack of U.S. currency, in spite of the declarations of the authorities that everything is returning to normal, but the banks continue with the restriction in the sale and must acquire them in the parallel market, at a higher value than the official exchange rate.
In this context, the National Chamber of Industries (CNI) and the Bolivian Institute of Foreign Trade (Ibce) propose short-term measures to generate the currency. Both entities agree that it is necessary to free exports and eliminate the Financial Transaction Tax (ITF).
But also, CNI suggests streamlining and simplifying processes at the National Agricultural Health and Food Safety Service (Senasag), speeding up procedures at the Foreign Trade Single Window (Vuce)..