| | |  Business News | October 2008 
Latin America Stocks Plunge as US Shares Slide
 Associated Press
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10/15/2008
Latin American stocks plunged Wednesday as European and US shares slipped and currency losses spread.
Brazil's Ibovespa index was down 7 percent to 38,659 at midday in Sao Paulo, paring Monday's record rebound after a massive equity sell off saw the index lose 25 percent of its value last week.
Brazil's currency, the real, slipped slightly to hover around 2.1 to the U.S. dollar, 30 percent below its early August rate as investors waited for the central bank to resume recent sales of dollar reserves to prop up the currency.
Mexico's benchmark IPC index meanwhile fell 4.4 percent to 21,277 in morning trading as the government began an investigation into publicly listed companies that may have failed to report purchases of highly speculative currency derivatives.
At least three Mexican companies have reported steep losses on currency derivatives in recent days as the peso seesawed as much as 30 percent last week.
Mexican Treasury Secretary Agustin Carstens has blamed the peso's steep fall in part on currency derivatives, in which Mexican companies bought dollars on contract to pay for them in the future date at fixed exchange rate.
Argentina's Merval index plunged 8.1 percent to 1,240 while and Chile's IPSA index dipped 1.4 percent to 2,408. |
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