LatinNews Daily - 30 October 2018

Development: On 29 October Mexico’s President-elect Andrés Manuel López Obrador confirmed that his incoming administration will cancel the project to build an entirely new international airport to service Mexico City (NAIM) launched by the outgoing government led by President Enrique Peña Nieto.... Read More

Development: On 29 October Brazilian daily Folha de São Paulo reported that, according to a Colombian diplomatic source, Colombia’s President Iván Duque is prepared to back Brazil’s far-right president-elect Jair Bolsonaro if he decides to intervene militarily in Venezuela.... Read More

* Venezuela’s agriculture minister, Wilmar Castro Soteldo, has announced that Venezuela will suspend all trade of animals and animal products and sub-products with Colombia due to an “imminent epidemiological risk” after a strain of foot-and-mouth disease (FMD) was found in the Colombian municipality of Maicao, in the northern border department of La Guajira.... Read More

Development: On 29 October, Onyx Lorenzoni, the chosen chief-of-staff of Brazil’s president-elect, Jair Bolsonaro, announced that Bolsonaro’s first international trip would be to Chile, and most likely followed by a visit to the US.... Read More

* Brazil’s central bank (BCB) has released the latest figures on the country’s fiscal deficit, which show that the public sector (comprising the central government, state enterprises, and local governments) recorded a primary deficit of R$24.6bn (US$6.6bn) in September.... Read More

Development: It has been announced that Guyana’s President David Granger, 73, is to travel to Cuba today (30 October) for a medical “investigation” of an unrevealed nature.... Read More

* Panama’s labour minister, Luis Ernesto Carles, has tendered his resignation, effective from 31 October.... Read More

* The Mexican peso closed the day trading at M$20.35/US$1 in local currency markets on 29 October compared to the M$19.70/US$1 exchange rate registered the previous day.... Read More

Development: On 29 October Argentina’s finance minister, Nicolás Dujovne, defended the government’s 2019 draft budget before the senate budget commission.... Read More

* BBVA, the Spanish banking group, has revised down its 2018 economic growth forecast for Argentina.... Read More