Along with my own views on U.S.-Latin America relations, you can find writings from Peter Hakim, President of the Inter-American Dialogue, and Amb. Paul D. Taylor, Senior Strategic Researcher at the Naval War College. Assuming Arturo Valenzuela will in fact be confirmed now that Congress is back in session, he will be soon facing the many issues we discussed – public security, sustainable energy, economic advancement, and hemispheric migration among others.

The Promise and Perils of South American Integration
Shannon O’Neil
January 12, 2009
World Politics Review

In the 21st century so far, regional integration has been one of the most notable elements of South American foreign relations. Picking up speed in recent years, the continent’s heads of state have enthusiastically met in numerous summits, promising increased political, economic, social, and development cooperation. Across the spectrum, governments are expanding current integration frameworks and entering into new agreements. Expectations are no less grand. As Brazil’s President Luis Inacio “Lula” da Silva recently stated, “South America, united, will move the board game of power in the world, not for its own benefit, but for everyone’s.” Read the entire article here.

Yet these analyses neglect the situation of the region’s private sector, which may prove to be the region’s Achilles’ heel. As Latin America’s economies slow down (due to tight credit, falling commodity prices, and falling consumer demand at home and worldwide), the poor and even irresponsible financial decisions of the region’s private sector are coming into relief.

With world markets teetering in recent months, rash financial bets – outside of the core competencies of many Latin American companies – went south. Stalwart firms such as Comercial Mexicana in Mexico and Grupo Votorantim in Brazil bet against the dollar and are now paying highly for it – perhaps with their very existence. More unwise financial bets are still waiting to be uncovered. In fact, one analyst recently estimated that derivative losses from Latin America’s largest companies could reach $50-60 billion in the coming months.

Latin America’s private sector troubles are not limited to dallying in derivative markets. Particularly troubling is the huge debt piled on by businesses in recent years, including many of the region’s largest companies. This became apparent this week when Cemex, a company long touted for its responsible and successful business strategy, was unable to refinance its debt. And Cemex is not alone. Others undoubtedly will follow, as tight worldwide credit markets limit the rollover of short term debt.

The macroeconomic and fiscal responsibility of most Latin American governments in recent years is welcome. And, it does mean that the effects of the worldwide financial crisis for the region differ this time around. But while necessary for a speedy recovery, public prudence alone is not sufficient. The financial health of the private sector – the main engine for the job creation and economic growth – is equally important. Here, the emerging data is not so sanguine, and some of it is missing or unreliable. Past crises have encouraged and sometimes forced greater reporting and transparency in the public sector, but the private sector remains somewhat of a blackbox. Yet how the private sector weathers the crisis will define the region’s economic future.

The easier change in some respects is the relationship with Cuba. Obama won Florida with the support of the majority of Latinos in that state, though he lost the Cuban American vote. Since Cuban-Americans were not decisive in his victory, Obama doesn’t owe them anything. In addition, polls show that younger Cuban Americans were more likely to vote democratic, suggesting a longer term shift away from the core support for current U.S. policy. Obama said in the campaign he will quickly relax restrictions on family visits and remittances to Cuba. This could be a first step in a longer and larger policy shift toward greater opening between the two countries, and ultimately (after several bilateral steps) asking Congress to end the embargo.

These policy changes would transform U.S.-Cuba relations. But they would also reverberate throughout the region, ending what is often seen in Latin America as a hypocritical stance between U.S. rhetoric and policy realities. And, these changes are more likely to actually bring democracy to Cuba, allowing for new information and influences on the island after nearly 50 years of forced semi-isolation.

In terms of Venezuela, Obama’s presidency will mean that the personal animosity between Presidents Bush and Chavez will no longer affect matters of state. Second, Obama’s personal profile and life story will make it much harder for Chavez to dismiss him as a “yankee imperialist.” And third, Chavez is running into problems of his own. In addition to domestic problems of rising inflation and crime, falling oil prices limit his “petrodiplomacy” with other countries in the region – lowering the decibel of his foreign policy microphone that until now has been turned against the United States. Obama has an opportunity to redirect these relations, though here the opportunity is less clear. Even with oil prices nearer to $50 than $150 a barrel, Chavez still has significant resources to throw around. And, with domestic problems escalating, he needs a foil. The United States is an easy target, no matter who the president is. But a change on Cuba would also make much of Chavez’s anti-American rhetoric ring less true across the region, limiting its effectiveness and perhaps leading to a different bilateral dynamic down the road.

Latin America: Not So Insulated After All

Latin America Studies Program, Council on Foreign Relations

Tuesday, November 18, 2008; 9:24 AM

In recent years, commentators and policymakers alike have praised Latin America for its growing financial independence and maturity. Fiscal discipline, high commodity prices, and sustained economic growth brought down external debt levels, built international reserves, and strengthened government and corporate balance sheets, placing the region on firmer economic footing. When crisis hit U.S. financial markets, many at first assumed that Latin America’s increasing openness and growing trade with China and India would cushion the impact of a U.S. slowdown. In September 2008, President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva of Brazil boasted, “People ask me about the crisis, and I answer, go ask Bush. It is his crisis, not mine.”

Yet the widely touted financial “decoupling” between the United States and Latin America (and emerging economies in general) was a myth. Contrary to initial expectations, the spiraling worldwide credit crisis is hitting Latin American nations hard. The region may be free of subprime mortgages, but plummeting access to cross-border financing is stifling lending and investment. In Brazil, the state-owned oil company Petrobras has announced delays in the exploration of its new deepwater oil finds. In Peru, funding for two iron-ore projects has also been delayed. As in the United States, once-boisterous consumer demand across the region is waning. After several quarters of robust private consumption growth, demand has weakened in Brazil, Mexico, and other countries, and overall consumer spending may stall in the coming quarters. With both firms and families holding back, future economic growth remains uncertain.

Capital Flight Takes Off

Rather ironically, money is flowing out of the region and seeking the safe haven of U.S. treasuries. This outflow is pressuring national currency reserves and precipitating steep declines against the U.S. dollar. The Brazilian real is down 27 percent against the dollar since July and the Mexican peso has plummeted 23 percent against the dollar since August. The trend also hammered stock markets across the region, with the Brazilian Bovespa and the Mexican Bolsa both falling 50 percent between August and November. Poor currency bets have brought to their knees economic stalwarts such as Comercial Mexicana in Mexico and Grupo Votorantim in Brazil that are nearly a century old. Concerns about bad future loans encouraged the marriage of two of Brazil’s largest banks–Banco Itau and Unibanco–forming the largest bank in Latin America.

Much of the pain is still to come. With credit scarce, investment down, and the United States and other parts of the world edging toward recession, demand for basic economic goods–commodities–is already declining. Prices for Latin American staples like wheat and corn fell over 35 percent and 30 percent respectively between August and November, while sugar slumped 20 percent until a recent uptick.

Petro-Economies Hit Twice

Oil–the most watched of Latin America’s commodity exports–has plummeted from its $147-a-barrel high three months ago. It has now fallen to below $60 a barrel. Given this volatility, the region’s endemic vulnerability to commodity price swings bodes ill for the future. Oil economies across the ideological spectrum will struggle to keep their economies afloat. The Mexican and Venezuelan governments, in particular, will suffer, as oil profits comprise 40 percent and 50 percent respectively of their public budgets. Oil at its current price level will curtail ambitious plans to cushion the impact of a U.S. recession through public infrastructure investment in Mexico, as it will hamper Venezuela’s wide-ranging petro-diplomacy. Venezuela’s capacity to borrow abroad to finance ambitious social programs may well atrophy, reinforcing the decline in President Hugo Chavez’s standing at home on the eve of local elections, scheduled for November 23.

Countries less dependent on oil income also will suffer from a global downturn. The price of soy already has fallen 40 percent since its recent peak in September and analysts anticipate further declines. As a result, economists have substantially lowered 2009 economic growth projections for Argentina, the world’s third-largest soy supplier, from 6.2 percent in January to 2.2 percent today. Chile’s dependence on copper prompts concern, too, since world prices have halved since April. Peru, second only to Chile in terms of copper production in the world, will also feel these declines. The Economist Intelligence Unit predicts Chilean economic growth will fall below 3 percent in 2008, and shaved off 1.5 percent from its estimates for Peru’s gross domestic product (GDP) growth to 5.5 percent. Even more diversified economies, such as Brazil’s, will see their first downturn in export earnings in a decade. Brazil’s growth projection for 2008 has almost halved from 4.3 percent in January to 2.4 percent in November.

Finally, countries receiving substantial remittances from their nationals abroad, such as Mexico and Central American countries, may feel pinched. Already Mexico, El Salvador, and Guatemala report significant decreases in returning funds, which support the poorer segments of their populations. Further declines could lead to worrisome increases in national poverty levels.

Reasons for Guarded Optimism

Given the region’s volatile economic history, these developments may seem nothing more than the recurrence of crises past: 1982, 1995, and 2001. But this time key differences provide some room for optimism. Latin American countries hold some of the lowest debt to GDP ratios in the world today, a sharp contrast with previous crises. Chile and Brazil, for instance, have become net creditors. Latin America’s governments now run more balanced budgets and pursue healthier fiscal policies. In April, both Peru and Brazil received investment-grade sovereign-debt ratings for the first time, joining Mexico and Chile. Lastly, Latin America now boasts a number of large “multilatinas”–multinational Latin American companies–with presences from Hudson Bay to Patagonia and beyond. Among these are Televisa, Gerdau Ameristeel, Cemex, Embraer, and Grupo Bimbo.

Still, a number of questions remain. As China, and soon the United States and perhaps other major economies, introduce massive economic stimulus packages, what might their effect be on Latin America? Could the region lose more capital absent similar domestic stimulus efforts?

The Geopolitical Dimension

Also unclear is the impact of the financial crisis on politics and political thought in the region. Despite obvious differences among Latin American governments’ approaches to the market, social policy, globalization, and the role of the state, most now believe that Washington failed to heed its own prescriptions for fiscal discipline. In the last few years, as Latin America’s left has gained in popularity and political power throughout the hemisphere, commentators have tended to group the region into “good” left governments (Brazil, Chile) and “bad” left governments (Venezuela, Bolivia). Following this superficial conceit, it may be tempting to conclude that the current financial crisis will reinforce the positions of those on the “bad” left, who will trumpet the end of market dominance. Yet after the dust settles, Latin America may also realize that weathering a global financial crisis will take more then ideology. Today, every goverment in the Western Hemisphere, including the United States, faces the same challenge: how to finance domestic programs that advance the common good, enhance global competitiveness, and ultimately deliver votes. Starting with the United States, a Western Hemisphere focused on solving problems rather than on market or political orthodoxy would be the best–if improbable–outcome, not only for the poor, but for working class sectors, middle class professionals, and economic elites as well.

While there is little in Latin America’s history to suggest that an end to political polarization is near, the region’s leaders do generally recognize what is at stake, and a political center with a global consciousness seems to be emerging, as Brazil’s leadership of the G-20 industrial and developing economies attests. The downturn also provides Latin American nations with an unexpected opportunity to demonstrate the region’s newfound fiscal prudence, creditworthiness, and accountability. If governments are able to ride out the crisis while providing for the most vulnerable populations in the region, Latin America should remain an increasingly attractive destination for investment once international funds begin to flow again. These trends would augur well for the emergence of a new financial architecture that reinforces Latin America’s path toward socially inclusive economic prosperity.

CFR Fellow Shannon O’Neil, Senior Fellow Julia Sweig, and research associates Sebastian Chaskel and Michael Bustamante all contributed to this article.

The report has gotten some great feedback so far, and I hope will help jumpstart a new conversation within the next Administration and Congress with regard to the region.