Any idea why Columbia was up almost 5% for 3Q? Drug exports?
Columbia University? I thought they mostly imported drugs.
msci Columbia is up 5% in 3Q in local terms… Can’t be oil, must be drugs… hmmm…
It’s because it was such a mess before. It’s still a mess. The scary thing is that the rest of the world is such a mess that you are thinking of investing in a country with erratic capital controls, a thorny relationship with Venezuela who is their chief trading partner but has a lunatic at the helm, has terrible troubles with drug cartels, can’t figure out free trade, etc…
But I still dont get what industry probably benefited, unless they are big on Sugar which ended the quarter in positive territory…
It’s not a particular industry, it’s that prior to August (I think) to invest in Colombia you had to put money in a Colombian govt controlled account for 6 months with no interest to get money into or out of equity markets. It was cumbersome, lost lots of interest money, contained nationalization risk, etc. In August, they did away with those rules and some foreign investment in the country actually happened. IMHO, stay away.
I’m staying away, trust me, just trying to understand why they were one of the only bright spots in 3Q.
I’m not saying you should stay away from all Colombian products…
I’m not staying away from Coffee, trust me 
Ah… Col_O_mbia …
yeah, its Colombia (country), not Columbia (univ) dummy
Columbia = USA. The national anthem used to be ‘Hail Columbia’ which could now become the official music of Sarah Palin who no doubt doesn’t know that.
JoeyDVivre Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > Columbia = USA. Only if we had named the country after Chris Columbus, instead of that Vespucci guy
At least we didn’t name is Vespuccia (which sounds like a place where they make Chianti).
Colombia has been getting its act together. Alvaro Uribe has been a miracle worker. doing the impossible task of advancing civil liberties and security in what was almost a failed state at the beginning of the decade. FARC, the guerilla/ communist group behind Colombia’s drug trade has been crippled due to some bold missions. 1. Taking out a high profile FARC operative in Ecuador back in March 2. Freeing very high profile through action movie style trickery that have been critical bargaining chips for both FARC and Hugo Chavez. Rural travel thought unthinkable 5 years ago is now normal In spite of reasons you for the Colombian free trade agreement being shot down hits on union leaders has plummeted almost 90% since Uribe has been in office according to the NY Times. A decent endowment of natural resources, an infrastructure that is no longer deadly to use, and the ability to go to work without being killed have a positive correlation with growth.
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