Economy

The decision by the Banco Central de Honduras to hike the monetary policy rate by 50 bps in its September meeting to 5.00% is in line with our end-2011 policy rate forecast, although... 2011-10-18

Inflation continues to tick up in Guatemala, reaching 7.63% y-o-y in August, up 7.04% from the month before, despite the central bank's 25 basis point interest rate hike in July. However,... 2011-10-04

Nicaragua's balance of payments appear to stabilizing going into 2012, as stronger than expected FDI flows have bolstered the financial account surplus to US$310mn in H111. However,... 2011-10-04

August's urban consumer price inflation continued slowing to 5.3% y-o-y, down from 5.4% y-o-y the previous month. This is likely to be welcome news to the Panamanian authorities, as... 2011-10-04

Inflation seems to have stabilized, coming in at 5.25% y-o-y in August, up only slightly from the 5.20% reading of a month earlier. The consumer price index continues to come within... 2011-10-04

Honduras's foreign currency reserve levels were down to US$2.6bn in August 2011, from US$3.1bn the previous month, and have dipped below the psychologically significant level of US$3.0bn... 2011-10-03

Panama's impressive Q211 real GDP growth of 11.4% y-o-y, up from 9.7% y-o-y in Q111, has prompted us to revise our 2011 real GDP growth forecast to 8.3%, from 6.3% previously. However,... 2011-10-03

Nicaragua's current account deficit came in at US$472mn in H111, which is broadly in line with our forecast of a US$814mn deficit for the full year. Although capital and financial account... 2011-09-29

We expect Guatemala's central bank to hold leading interest rates at 5.00% for the remainder of the year, and to cut by 50 basis points in 2012 to 4.50% as concerns about economic growth... 2011-09-27

BMI View: We are forecasting consumer price inflation in 2011 to come in at 7.00% on the back of an especially weak harvest and high oil prices. However, in 2012 we expect to see inflation... 2011-09-23