Ending a nearly 60-year insurgency, the Colombian government and the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) have finally settled on their peace agreement. The implementation has been overseen by international observers;
Landlocked Bolivia is viewed as South America’s poorest country, but its fortunes may be turning for the better. The government plans to nearly double its coca production but also further develop what is purported to be the earth’s single-largest reserve of lithium, a light metal used in batteries, which is experiencing skyrocketing demand. Bolivia could be on the cusp of a rags-to-riches rebirth.
Since taking office in 2015, Argentina President Mauricio Macri has subjected the country to an economic “shock” therapy to try and jumpstart the economy. At first, the economic policy seemed as if it would result in a prompt change in government
When considering the world’s fastest-growing economies, the usual suspects of China and India invariably crop up in most discussions. Of course, this is to be expected given that, despite its recent slowdown, China’s GDP (gross domestic product) still grew by 6.7 percent in 2016
At the G20 summit on July 7, US President Donald Trump sat immediately next to his Mexican counterpart, Enrique Peña Nieto. After they each spoke about the progress being made in trade issues between the two countries, reporters volleyed a flurry of questions at the US president
Digitisation is driving unions across the financial world, and especially in the payments industry. Mastercard’s pioneering acquisition of the UK bank-account-based payments system Vocalink sets a precedent for such mergers all around the globe, in large measure due to the growing influence of the world’s first truly digital generation, the Millennials, who demand instant transactions in real-time.
Millennial and Gen X bank customers seem to be relatively independent, adept at employing online and mobile apps to complete their financial transactions. However, research shows that these digitally confident customers still value personalised advice, especially regarding investment decisions—and retail banks are in the best position to meet that need through immediate, tailored solutions developed using available customer data.
The tidal wave of banking regulations during the aftermath of the last financial crisis has given a boost to an unlikely beneficiary: artificial intelligence. Regtech along with AI, ML and NLP are the new warriors employed by many forward-thinking banks to get a handle on the massively costly compliance workload, and many are witnessing a return to profitability as a result.
Traditional banks have a long history, which is good and bad—good because of well-established customer relationships; bad due to cumbersome legacy systems, some created in the days of analog, that struggle to adapt to the rapidly changing demands of the digital age. Like it or not, to keep up with customers and competitors, most banks have a lot more ground to cover.
Chile has been one of South America’s mainstays, lauded as possibly the continent’s wealthiest and most stable country. But the Chilean economy, the health of which is heavily dependent on copper exports, has suffered greatly since the decline of the commodity super-cycle in 2014-15, and credit-rating agencies are showing no mercy—making life even more difficult for the country’s incumbent government.
