Peso heading NORTE!!

Joel y Luza says on Jun 17, 2008, 10:22:

Colombia's Peso Touches Nine-Year High on Rate Rise Speculation
By Andrea Jaramillo
June 16 (Bloomberg) -- Colombia's peso rose to a nine-year high on speculation the central bank will lift
its key lending rate this week to curb inflation.
``Rising prices of oil and other basic goods such as wheat are feeding into expectations the central bank
will raise rates this week,'' said Alvaro Camaro, chief analyst at Stanford Financial Group's unit in
Bogota.
The peso gained 1.4 percent to 1,678 per U.S. dollar at 4:01 p.m. New York time, from 1,702.2 on June
13, according to the Colombian foreign-exchange electronic transactions system, known as SET-FX. It
earlier touched 1,675.15 per dollar, its strongest since June 1999.
Increased foreign direct investment and the widening gap between Colombian and U.S. benchmark
interest rates have fueled an 18.2 percent rally in the peso this year, the biggest advance among 26
emerging-market currencies tracked by Bloomberg. The 7.75 percentage point difference between
Colombian and U.S. benchmark rates is the widest since July 2001.
Banco de la Republica will increase its overnight lending rate by a quarter-percentage point to 10
percent on June 20, according to 10 of 18 economists surveyed by Bloomberg. The other eight analysts
forecast policy makers will leave the rate unchanged at 9.75 percent, its highest level since August
2001.

Also, wire transmissions from the US, heading south is down, as much as 3-4%, though, I think Mexico makes up the lion's share of that inflow of cash...I tend to be pretty bullish, when it comes to the US economy, but that is changing fast!

I never really thought much of the currency markets. mainly in the abstract of my job, but WOW! I send my wife money, and see she is getting about 300-400 COP/USD less than a couple of months ago, and it takes a bite out of her budget! The unexpected cost of immigration....

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gamm2 says on Jun 17, 2008, 10:42:

Yeah Joel, it really does suck doesnt it? I never really thought about currency markets until recently either, but once it starts to affect you! I know some people think this is a tired topic on the forum but know that I am right there with you, commiserating. my boyfriend loves to tell me everyday how low the dollar is going. At first I used to ignore him, but now its like aghhhh. Thankfully I found out that my job is giving me a bottom exchange rate of 2000 for half of the money. So Im going to just try and live on that money and transfer the other amount into dollars right away and just use it for dollar purchases. Or I could even try to make a little money on it if it keeps going down. That seems a little complicated right now though..

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sloopskipper says on Jun 17, 2008, 10:58:

Yep, seems some of us are just too late to the party.

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Frank Rizzo says on Jun 17, 2008, 21:09:

Gotta just grin and bear it..........i ain't stoppin..........

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BillBigD says on Jun 17, 2008, 22:11:

Colombian stock market didn't like the move down another 1%. 11% for the year

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webmanco says on Jun 18, 2008, 04:30:

Peso going North, Dollar going south, but dollars are scarse, maybe people think it would be hard for the dollar to go farther south.

...A yo, déjenme queto y no me jodan má! ...

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