Economy

• Saturday, June 9th 2012 - 05:05 UTC

  Argentine industrial activity falls 3% in April, but up 1.1% in first four months

  

  Industrial activity in Argentina dropped 3% in April compared to the same month a year ago, with the first four months closing with 1.1% growth, although with a declining tendency according to the latest data from the Argentine Industrial Union, UIA.

• Saturday, June 9th 2012 - 02:46 UTC

  Chile’s May inflation on target but government fears external risks

  

  Chile's consumer price index remained unchanged in May, the government statistics agency INE said on Friday, slowing its pace from April as lower food and transport prices offset higher electricity costs. Prices rose 0.1% in April, the INE said last month.

• Saturday, June 9th 2012 - 02:41 UTC

  FAO food price index fell by 4% in May on prospects of good cereal production

  

  United Nation’s Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) said global food prices dropped sharply in May due to generally favourable supplies, growing global economic uncertainties and a strengthening of the US dollar.

• Saturday, June 9th 2012 - 00:37 UTC

  Argentina rapidly becoming too expensive for foreign tourists

  

  Argentina is rapidly becoming an expensive country for tourists and evidence of this is the declining number of tourists arriving in the country in the first months of the year while the number of Argentine travelling overseas is soaring, according to Mario Lielman, chair of the Buenos Aires Tourism and Travel Agencies Association.

• Friday, June 8th 2012 - 23:34 UTC

  Beverage industry blasts New York for limiting sale of oversized sugary drinks

  

  New York City's top health official shot back at critics who have blasted the city's plan to limit the sale of oversized sugary drinks such as soda, calling beverage industry opposition ridiculous.

• Friday, June 8th 2012 - 21:06 UTC

  Fitch downgrades Repsol rating to BBB- on fears of YPF seizure impact

  

  Repsol, the Spanish oil producer whose Argentine unit YPF was nationalized in April, was cut to the lowest investment grade by Fitch Ratings, the first downgrade since reducing dividends to shore up its finances.

• Friday, June 8th 2012 - 20:51 UTC

  Bank of England stand-by on optimism over a solution to the Euro debt crisis

  

  The Bank of England has resisted injecting further emergency liquidity to the UK economy as optimism over finding a solution to the Euro zone debt crisis grew.

• Friday, June 8th 2012 - 20:21 UTC

  China lowers key rates and gives banks more flexibility to help boost growth

  

  China has cut its key interest rates for the first time since 2008, in an attempt to boost its slowing growth. The benchmark one-year loan rate was cut by a quarter of one percent to 6.31% while deposit rates were cut from 3.5% to 3.25%.

• Friday, June 8th 2012 - 02:59 UTC

  Argentine striking farmers take to the roads; government rejects negotiations

  

  The Argentine Government warned that it has “no plans” to change the farming sector's agenda, therefore will not meet with members of the Liaison Board amid a national strike that began on Wednesday to protest against the property tax hikes in the Buenos Aires province.

• Friday, June 8th 2012 - 02:08 UTC

  Alliance of the Pacific emerges as a potent challenge for Mercosur and Brazil

  

  The leading countries of Latin America’s Pacific Rim with the exception of Ecuador and a few Central American countries, agreed to conform the Alliance of the Pacific an ambitious integration project which has good relations with Washington and is targeted to accompany the growing influence of the Asia-Pacific basin.