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FILE PHOTO: Jacksonville Jaguars quarterback Blaine Gabbert examines his arm after being sacked by Houston Texans safety Danieal Manning forcing a turnover during their NFL football game in Houston November 18, 2012. Gabbert was injured on the play and was taken out of the game. REUTERS/Richard Carson
March 25, 2019
After being cut by the Tennessee Titans 10 days ago, the Tampa Bay Buccaneers are expected to sign quarterback Blaine Gabbert, according to a report Monday.
According to The Athletic, Gabbert’s experience with new Tampa Bay head coach Bruce Arians while both were with the Arizona Cardinals in the 2017 season is a key factor in the mutual decision.
Gabbert, 29, was the Titans backup quarterback to Marcus Mariota last season and played eight games for the oft-injured starter, going 2-1 in three starts. For the season Gabbert completed 60.4 percent of his passes for 626 yards, four touchdown passes and four interceptions.
The Titans moved on from Gabbert as a backup when they traded for former Miami Dolphins quarterback Ryan Tannehill on March 15, releasing Gabbert the same day.
His final start last season came in a winner-take-all season finale against the Titans’ AFC South rivals, the Indianapolis Colts. Tennessee lost 33-17 to miss the postseason. In that game Gabbert went 18-for-29 for 165 yards, one touchdown and two interceptions.
Originally selected 10th overall in the 2011 NFL Draft by the Jacksonville Jaguars, Gabbert has played for four teams in his eight seasons — the Jaguars (2011-13), the San Francisco 49ers (2014-16), plus the Cardinals (2017) and Titans last season.
Gabbert owns a career 13-35 record as an NFL starter, working mostly as a backup since 2013. For his career he has played in 56 games (48 starts), throwing for 9,063 yards with 48 TDs, 47 interceptions and a 71.7 passer rating.
–Field Level Media
Source: OANN
FILE PHOTO: An aerial view shows the skyline and lakefront of Chicago, Illinois, U.S., August 14, 2014. REUTERS/Jim Young
March 25, 2019
By Karen Pierog
CHICAGO (Reuters) – Financial uncertainties swirling around Illinois and Chicago may not deter bond buyers when the two fiscally shaky governments sell more than $1.1 billion of debt this week.
Slim supply in the $3.8 trillion U.S. municipal market, yield-hungry investors, and the shelving of interest rate hikes by the Federal Reserve for the remainder of 2019 have tipped the scale in favor of sellers, investment managers said.
“We believe that if (Chicago and Illinois are) going to pick a time to come to market, now is a pretty good time to be coming,” said Dan Heckman, national investment consultant at U.S. Bank.
Illinois, the lowest-rated U.S. state at a notch or two above junk due to its huge unfunded pension liability and chronic structural budget deficit, will offer $452 million of taxable and tax-exempt general obligation (GO) bonds in competitive bidding on Tuesday.
On Wednesday, underwriters led by Barclays are scheduled to price $700 million of GO bonds for Chicago, which is also struggling with pension funding and deficits, just days before the city elects a mayor to replace the retiring Rahm Emanuel, who served two terms.
“My gut tells me these deals are going to get done and done at a level that is pretty attractive for Illinois and the city of Chicago and over a longer period of time will likely prove unattractive for investors,” said Nicholos Venditti, a portfolio manager at Thornburg Investment Management.
Illinois’ deal comes just weeks after the new Democratic governor, J.B. Pritzker, unveiled a fiscal 2020 budget and a plan to rescue the state’s sagging finances by switching to graduated income tax rates via a constitutional amendment process.
Budget measures, including the use of one-time revenue and a more than $800 million reduction in contributions to the state’s woefully underfunded pensions, could push Illinois closer to a junk credit rating.
“That is a significant risk,” Venditti said, adding that the situation is even “scarier” in Chicago, which already has a junk rating with Moody’s Investors Service, along with ratings of BBB-plus with S&P Global Ratings and BBB-minus with Fitch Ratings.
The city’s two mayoral candidates – Toni Preckwinkle, who currently heads the Cook County Board of Commissioners, and attorney Lori Lightfoot – have not disclosed detailed plans for addressing a projected $252 million fiscal 2020 budget deficit and escalating pension payments that will top $2 billion in 2023.
“At the city level, I think investors are flying blind,” Venditti said.
Meanwhile, demand is strong with municipal bond funds, including high yield, reporting big weekly inflows of investor dollars since early January, according to Lipper.
Muni bond supply totaling $63.8 billion so far in 2019 is 12 percent below the average year-to-date volume in the previous five years, according to Refinitiv data.
Given the “very, very attractive” muni bond environment for issuers, Heckman said there will be appetite for debt from Illinois and Chicago if their deals are “priced appropriately.”
Investors have been demanding hefty yields for the governments’ GO debt, with Illinois paying the biggest penalty among states.
(Reporting by Karen Pierog in Chicago; Editing by Matthew Lewis)
Source: OANN
A general view shows solar panels to produce renewable energy at the Urbasolar photovoltaic park in Gardanne, France, June 25, 2018. REUTERS/Jean-Paul Pelissier
March 23, 2019
By Lynn Adler
NEW YORK (LPC) – Global standards set in place by loan trade associations this week that tie syndicated loan pricing to companies’ sustainability performance are expected to stimulate the budding U.S. green lending market.
Less than a handful of U.S. companies have issued sustainability-linked loans since the first deal for natural gas utility CMS Energy was completed last June, far lagging firms in Europe which are leading the global push to improve environmental performance.
The new sustainability standards, which were issued on Wednesday by the Loan Market Association (LMA), the Loan Syndications and Trading Association (LSTA) and the Asia Pacific Loan Market Association (APLMA), are expected to bolster borrowers’ and investors’ confidence in green lending.
Sustainability-linked loans are any kind of loans that incentivize borrowers with margin reductions or increases depending on their ability to meet pre-set environmental performance targets.
A lack of direction and consistency in being able to identify and measure these goals has been stifling growth so far, bankers said.
“By having pricing tied to a borrower’s improvement in sustainability performance, it directly incentivizes borrowers to make improvements,” said Tess Virmani, the LSTA’s associate general counsel. “If market interest keeps gathering steam, then the sustainability-linked loans will find a good home in the corporate loan market.”
One of the main differences between sustainability-linked loans and green loans, which are linked to use of proceeds, is that they can be raised for general corporate purposes rather than specific projects. Loans for general corporate purposes are more widely issued, which is likely to boost sustainability-linked loans.
Key characteristics of sustainability-linked deals include disclosing the loan’s tie to the company’s overall social responsibility strategy; having sustainability pricing targets arranged between borrower and lender; reporting on sustainability performance and external reviews, according to the new lending principles.
TESTING THE WATERS
Global water technology company Xylem Inc became the fourth U.S. company to issue a sustainability-linked loan, with an $800 million revolving credit in early March. Xylem is the first general industrial company to commit to reducing its environmental footprint this way.
The four U.S. sustainability-linked loans that have come to the market so far — two this year and two last year — tally roughly $8 billion. Banks are targeting the sector as a growth area as they seek to improve their own credentials.
“Banks want to show their growing commitment to sustainable development goals, and this is one of the products they might use to show that,” said Anna Zubets, vice president at Moody’s Investors Service.
Last year, sustainability-linked loans issued globally topped $36 billion, led by European companies, according to Moody’s.
Global issuance in the more mature green bond market, in contrast, could jump 20 percent to $200 billion this year, the rating agency said.
“The U.S. is a little behind on the discussion but you see it happening here as well. More than 80 percent of the S&P 500 listed companies are now issuing sustainability reports and it becomes a bigger discussion among shareholders and investors and asset managers, which is what we see among our client base,” said Anne van Riel, head of sustainable finance at ING.
“I expect that that will automatically carry over to more sustainable financing, whether green loans, green bonds or sustainable-linked loans.”
ING was the sustainability coordinator for Xylem’s deal, and helped the company to decide reasonable but ambitious performance targets to guide loan pricing.
Interest margins on Xylem’s general corporate purpose revolving credit will be based on social and corporate governance ratings by independent provider Sustainalytics. Citigroup, JP Morgan, ING, BNP Paribas and Wells Fargo were lead arrangers and bookrunners.
Pricing is initially based on ratings, opening at 110 basis points over Libor with a 15-basis points facility fee, and then will be adjusted up or down by up to 5 basis points based on its ability to achieve predetermined sustainability targets, according to a regulatory filing.
The other sustainability-linked loans completed in the United States so far include global logistics real estate group Prologis Inc in January, renewable energy and utility company Avangrid Inc last July and electric and natural gas utility CMS Energy and its main unit Consumers Energy last June.
“Some treasurers and CFOs are a bit more conservative, and when they see their peers doing it or see more market activity they will also follow,” said van Riel.
Having clear standards for the asset class is a way to hold management accountable for promises made, and make green identification more than a marketing tool.
“In order for money to continue to flow into these kinds of products, reporting standards are going to have to develop and mature so the market can be credible and management can be held accountable for goals,” Zubets said,
“Investors can have trust that if something is labeled as green it is actually going to deliver an impact.”
(Reporting By Lynn Adler; Editing by Tessa Walsh and Michelle Sierra)
Source: OANN
David Hookstead | Reporter
The Thursday ratings for March Madness games on CBS weren’t pretty.
According to The Hollywood Reporter, games on CBS were down 26 percent from the same slots last tournament. Kentucky’s beatdown of Abilene Christian and Wofford’s win over Seton Hall only got a rating of 2.6, which means rough 2.6 percent of households with televisions tuned in. (RELATED: The March Madness Bracket Has Been Released)
Obviously, these numbers aren’t good at all. As of this moment, we don’t have the numbers for all the other games, but these CBS ratings are pathetic.
Down 26 percent? Are you kidding me? Did this country all of a sudden start hating cold beer and freedom? Our founding fathers are rolling over in their graves at these numbers.
All anybody is talking about these days is March Madness. It’s mind-boggling to me that the numbers are so bad. I honestly don’t understand it at all. (RELATED: Watch Wisconsin
Kentucky is a national brand. No matter who they’re playing, you’d think plenty of people would tune in. I guess the Wildcats just aren’t the draw they once were.
You hate to see it!
Let’s hope the numbers rebound big time down the stretch because this country is doomed if people have given up on watching college basketball.
Source: The Daily Caller
Brazil’s President Jair Bolsonaro speaks during a joint news conference with U.S. President Donald Trump in the Rose Garden of the White House in Washington, U.S., March 19, 2019. REUTERS/Kevin Lamarque
March 22, 2019
By Jamie McGeever
BRASILIA (Reuters) – Standing beside U.S. President Donald Trump on a crisp afternoon outside the White House in Washington this week, a smiling Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro enjoyed a moment in the sun.
Less than three months since taking office and with the Brazilian stock market at a record above 100,000 points, the former army captain was cementing his place on the world stage. He is following his U.S. trip with visits to Chile and Israel.
Back home, however, a political, economic and market storm was brewing that would turn the week into one of the most foreboding for his young administration, which has been slow to confront the mounting challenges to his ambitious reform agenda.
Brazilian financial markets reeled at the arrest of former president Michel Temer on corruption charges on Thursday and the unveiling on Wednesday of cuts in the military budget that were much more modest than expected. An opinion poll also showed plunging support for Bolsonaro’s government.
Even before the latest developments, investors were uneasy about a global slowdown and a string of Brazilian economic indicators showing the tepid recovery from a 2015-16 recession is losing steam. The central bank took a dovish turn this week and the government cut its 2019 growth forecasts.
The Bovespa stock index shed 5 percent this week, its biggest weekly loss since August. On Friday, the 10-year bond yield jumped more than 25 basis points and the real slumped 2.5 percent, both their biggest moves since November.
(GRAPHIC: Bovespa index – weekly change – https://tmsnrt.rs/2OhZkVD)
(GRAPHIC: Brazil’s 10-year bond yield – daily change – https://tmsnrt.rs/2UOvw5p)
(GRAPHIC: Brazilian real – https://tmsnrt.rs/2UR8sTk)
Investors are more focused than ever on Bolsonaro’s signature proposal to overhaul the pension system in hopes of shoring up public finances, boosting growth and generating over 1 trillion reais ($257 billion) of savings over the next decade.
“The next three to four months are crucial for the country,” XP Investimentos credit analysts wrote in a note to clients on Friday, adding they remained optimistic that “transformational” reform will be passed.
“However, we anticipate volatility, with tough negotiations ahead for pension reform and a series of risks that may increase tensions, like we saw this week,” they said.
ALL EYES ON PENSIONS
Economists, traders, analysts, politicians and central bankers agree Brazil’s economic fate lies largely with pension reform, and progress on that front appears to be slowing.
The Temer scandal has the potential to damage the pension reform drive. A close Temer confidant, who was also arrested, is married to the mother-in-law of Rodrigo Maia, speaker of the lower house of Congress and chief architect of the coalition to pass pension reform.
Investors were also underwhelmed by a government proposal on military pensions that would save around a tenth of what was promised last month due to salary hikes. That raised the prospect of other groups hardening demands in negotiations.
“This could create challenges for the administration in Congress as they were arguing this is a reform that fights privileges from public servants,” wrote Morgan Stanley economists.
Bolsonaro’s eroding support will also make it harder for him to close the deal on pension reform. An Ibope poll this week showed his government’s popularity plummeted to the worst approval rating at this early stage of any administration since Brazil returned to democracy three decades ago.
All of that has investors and policymakers putting off hopes for a more robust economic recovery.
In keeping interest rates at a record low of 6.50 percent this week, the central bank highlighted the economy’s weak performance and downgraded the inflation threat level.
On Friday, the Economy Ministry also cut their 2019 forecasts for growth, inflation, average interest rates and the real’s average exchange rate.
($1 = 3.8897 reais)
(Reporting by Jamie McGeever; Editing by David Gregorio)
Source: OANN
FILE PHOTO: Nike shoes are seen on display in New York, U.S., March 18, 2019. REUTERS/Shannon Stapleton
March 22, 2019
By Nivedita Balu
(Reuters) – Shares of Nike Inc fell 4 percent on Friday after the sportswear maker’s North America sales fell short of estimates for the first time in a year, but Wall Street analysts seemed more enthused about its new products and online growth.
The company faced intense pressure from European rivals Adidas and Puma a year ago, but has managed to win back market share with new launches of its popular Air Max and Jordan sneakers, increased focus on women’s wear and higher investment in online business.
“The athletic footwear cycle and brand power are solid. Nike’s business is strengthening in North America, and we expect the company to continue to recapture the share it has lost to Adidas,” said Jefferies analyst, adding that the stock might be slightly down given “high expectations”.
The company on Thursday blamed delay in new launches for a slowdown in apparel sales in North America during the quarter, which was marked by an outcry on social media after a Nike sneaker worn by Duke University basketball star Zion Williamson ripped open during a high-profile game.
Still, the stock continues to be one of Wall Street’s favorites. Out of 34 brokerages covering the stock, 25 analysts rate it ‘buy’ or higher and only one analyst has a sell rating on the stock.
Nike’s shares trade at 28.6 times the company’s 12-month forward earnings, compared with rival Adidas’ 21.5 times and Under Armour’s 59.5 times, according to Refinitiv IBES data.
Just two brokerages – Credit Suisse and UBS – lowered their target on the stock. Credit Suisse cut its price by $3 to $97, still well above the median price target of $92.5.
Nike’s online business, which includes sales from the SNKRS and Nike apps, was the main profit driver in the reported quarter. Revenue from that business rose 36 percent in the quarter.
While most analysts were enthusiastic about the results, some said higher expenses as the only dark spot in an otherwise strong report.
Jefferies analyst Randal Konik flagged a rise in selling, general and administrative expenses due to wage-related expenses.
(Reporting by Nivedita Balu in Bengaluru; Writing by Sweta Singh; Editing by Saumyadeb Chakrabarty)
Source: OANN
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Success in politics — and in political predictions — depends on the ability to distinguish between old rules of thumb that don’t apply any more and old rules of thumb that do.
Take the old rule that an officeholder’s chances of re-election depend on what James Carville in 1992 took to calling “the economy, stupid.”
That used to be a real thing. The Great Depression took President Herbert Hoover down from 58 percent of the vote in 1928 to 40 percent in 1932. The return of economic growth enabled President Franklin Roosevelt to increase his 57 percent in 1932 to 61 percent in 1936, and then to win re-election twice in the shadow of World War II in the 1940s.
Amid recession, President Ronald Reagan’s job approval sunk to 41 percent in January 1983. Amid surging growth, it rose to 58 percent in October 1984. A month later, he won 59 percent of the popular vote and carried 49 states.
During President Donald Trump’s time in office, the economy has improved sharply, with record-low unemployment and — something not seen since Reagan’s time or before — with the biggest income gains for low earners. The public’s rating of the economy has improved sharply as well.
But Trump’s job approval has barely changed at all. After hitting a low of 37 percent in the RealClearPolitics average of public polls in December 2017, it has remained steady for more than a year, oscillating between 40 and 44 percent.
Analysts have attributed wobbles upward or downward to specific events. But given the inexactitude inevitable in polling, they may not represent any change at all. Trump’s numbers remain slightly below the high 40s, the pre-election-year approval numbers of recent presidents who have won a second term. But their approval numbers were closely tied to perceptions of the economy. Trump’s aren’t.
One reason old political rules stop working is that one generation of voters has different experiences from those of the generations before. Voters who remembered the Great Depression of the 1930s and World War II in the 1940s rewarded incumbent presidents who seemed to have produced prosperity and peace with landslide re-elections.
They were willing to cross party lines to express their gratitude for policies that seemed to prevent the horrors that were all too familiar. So incumbent presidents of both parties won between 57 and 61 percent of the popular vote in 1956, 1964, 1972 and 1984. Since 1988, only a shrinking sliver of voters remembers what Americans used to call “the depression” and “the war,” and no president has won more than 53 percent.
Just as Trump has not been able to raise his job rating to the improving economy, so his political enemies have not been able to lower it significantly. Each new supposedly shocking personal revelation has failed to shock; each eagerly whispered allegation of criminal collusion has failed to disenchant.
It’s apparent now that Trump’s support — the 21st-century Republican core minus a couple million white college grads, plus a couple million white non-grads — is sticking with him pretty much regardless of events or outcomes. And that the coalition that makes up the 21st-century Democrats, with the reverse adjustments, is solidly arrayed against.
This is actually in line with old political rules, rules with origins far before the 1930s and 1940s. The Republican Party, from its formation in 1854, has been built around a core of people considered to be ordinary Americans but not by themselves a majority. The Democratic Party, from its formation in 1832, has been a coalition of those regarded as out-peoples, often at odds with one another but together often a majority.
Both parties’ voters today are acting characteristically. The vast body of Republicans has no truck with the plaints of never-Trumpers. The Democrats are in turmoil, panicking at the possibility of having enemies on the left, to the point that House Democrats at first couldn’t pass a resolution decrying the blatant anti-Semitism of one of their own.
So we see multiple presidential candidates racing to embrace programs with 8 to 20-some percent support in the general electorate — racial reparations, ninth-month abortions, tearing down existing border walls, abolishing Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
We see eminences, hoarse from denouncing Donald Trump for violating longstanding norms, now advocating the abolishment of the Electoral College; packing the Supreme Court; enacting the 16-year-old vote and the Green New Deal, with its abolition of gas-powered automobiles and flatulent cattle.
Old rules of thumb, it seems, can yield to even older ones.
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A view of the headquarters of state owned oil company Pemex in Mexico City, Mexico March 5, 2019. REUTERS/Daniel Becerril
March 22, 2019
ACAPULCO, Mexico (Reuters) – Mexico’s deputy finance minister said on Thursday the government was considering using part of a $15.4 billion public income stabilization fund to pay some debt obligations for heavily leveraged state oil company Pemex.
The finance ministry is working on a new design for the fund to make it counter cyclical, deputy minister Arturo Herrera said in an interview with TV network ADN40, during a banking conference in Acapulco.
Grappling with Pemex’s financial health has been a key challenge for President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, who took office in December. The entity holds roughly $106 billion in financial debt, the highest amount of any state oil firm in Latin America.
“We’d like to design it as a counter cyclical fund, like the copper funds in Chile are designed, where the resources are used not when the government wants to, but when the economy makes them necessary… In times of abundance, you put money into these resources,” he said.
“As a second part of the fund, we’d like to use it to pay some of the debt obligations that Pemex has,” he said.
Pemex has some $16 billion of debt payments due by the end of next year. Herrera said Mexico’s fund has a generous margin that could be put to helping Pemex.
Herrera said he expected to make an announcement in the next two or three weeks on the plan to use the public income stabilization fund, which holds about 290 billion pesos ($15.4 billion).
Rating agency Fitch downgraded Pemex’s credit rating in late January to one level above junk status, citing the company’s high leverage and tax burden.
In February, Mexico said it would inject $3.9 billion into Pemex, promising to strengthen its finances and prevent a further credit downgrade. Investors largely saw the plan as only a short-term fix.
Chile has two sovereign wealth funds. Unusual for Latin American countries, they were created to help finance pensions and as a “rainy day fund” for times of economic stress.
(Reporting by Dave Graham and Stefanie Eschenbacher in Acapulco; and Adriana Barrera and Frank Jack Daniel in Mexico City; Writing by Daina Beth Solomon)
Source: OANN
Sixty-four percent of New York voters say they definitely would not vote to re-elect Donald Trump as president, according to a new Quinnipiac University poll.
Twenty-one percent say they would vote for him and 12 percent say they would consider it.
Here is how the New York survey breaks down:
- 7 percent of Republicans said they definitely would not vote for Trump’s re-election. 67 percent said they would vote for him and 20 percent said they would consider it.
- 93 percent of Democrats said they would not vote for his re-election, compared to 3 percent who definitely would cast their ballots for Trump. 2 percent said they would consider voting for him.
- 60 percent of independents would not vote for Trump, while 16 percent definitely would. 17 percent would consider it.
- 28 percent of all those polled have a favorable opinion of him, compared to 67 percent who view him unfavorably.
- 62 percent view former Vice President Joe Biden favorably, compared to 24 percent who do not. Biden had the highest rating among those Democrats considered to be presidential hopefuls.
The poll, conducted March 13-18, surveyed 1,216 voters in the state of New York. The margin of error is plus or minus 3.8 percentage points.
Source: NewsMax Politics
FILE PHOTO: Mexico’s President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador attends a news conference at the National Palace in Mexico City, Mexico February 15, 2019. REUTERS/Henry Romero/File Photo
March 21, 2019
By Dave Graham and Stefanie Eschenbacher
ACAPULCO, Mexico (Reuters) – For two years, financiers at Mexico’s biggest annual banking bash issued veiled warnings about the risk of veteran leftist Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador taking power.
Now he is president, they and industry bosses have changed tack, pledging support for the popular new leader and his plans to revive the economy from the bottom up.
Bank bosses have used the run-up to the banking convention in Acapulco beginning on Thursday to signal approval for Lopez Obrador’s plans to tackle chronic inequality via welfare handouts, ramp up financial inclusion and lift economic growth.
“The financial sector has been and will continue to be committed to Mexico’s development, which is why he celebrate and go along with the measures … announced by the Mexican government,” Marcos Martinez, head of the Mexican banking association (ABM), said at a recent event with Lopez Obrador.
Martinez and other bankers hope the president will meet pledges to tackle corruption and gang violence in Latin America’s No. 2 economy, buttressing growth with the rule of law.
Still, skepticism about his economic credentials is widespread in business circles. So far executives have reasoned they have more to gain by working with him than picking a fight with a president whose approval ratings run close to 80 percent.
Lopez Obrador, who took office in December, wiped billions of the value of Mexican financial assets when he canceled a new Mexico City airport on Oct. 29. Proposals floated by his MORENA party in Congress to curb bank fees also spooked markets.
Yet even as he rolls out welfare schemes across Mexico, he has promised to run a tight budget to protect the country’s investment-grade credit rating and says he can achieve average annual growth of 4 percent during his six-year term.
At this week’s conference in Acapulco, Mexico’s banks would likely deliver a clear message to the president that they will work with him to achieve his goals, said a senior financial industry source, speaking on condition of anonymity.
That could unlock funds for Lopez Obrador’s plan to create jobs via infrastructure spending, and complement the goal of employers’ federation COPARMEX to lift the spending power of the lowest paid by tripling the minimum wage by 2024.
Cooperating with Lopez Obrador to encourage an expansion of the Mexican middle class could become a major driver of growth, and help curb the president’s worst instincts, a senior industrialist said, speaking on condition of anonymity.
Stating Mexico had “more financial resources than there are projects”, the new head of Mexico’s powerful CCE business lobby, Carlos Salazar, said last month it would work to end extreme poverty by the end of Lopez Obrador’s term.
By then, the ABM aims to get 30 million more people to use banking services – nearly three-quarters of those estimated to be without an account – and to support domestic demand by boosting lending to small businesses, homebuyers and families.
Deputy finance minister Arturo Herrera told Reuters the government would push hard on financial inclusion at the banking convention, where Lopez Obrador is due to speak on Friday.
However, for the president to make the most of the goodwill in boardrooms, he must work harder to undo the damage caused by poor decisions such as the scrapping of the airport, said Gustavo de Hoyos, head of employers’ lobby COPARMEX.
Business wanted to invest, but right now, the government scored only about “50 percent” on investor confidence, he added.
“If the president and his team can take advantage of these strengths,” de Hoyos told Reuters, “I think we could see really big progress in the course of this administration.”
(Reporting by Dave Graham and Stefanie Eschenbacher; Editing by Lisa Shumaker)
Source: OANN
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