BTG Pactual is the most highly regarded full-service brokerage house in Latin America. In the three Institutional Investor surveys that measure performance in the region, the Brazil-based firm ranks first in research, second in sales and fourth in trading services, giving it a cumulative score across all three platforms that trumps its rivals’ — thus laying claim to the title of Latin America’s Best Brokerage for 2012.

Two U.S.-based outfits tie for second place: Bank of America Merrill Lynch (first in trading services, second in research and fifth in sales) and J.P. Morgan (No. 3 in research and in sales, and second in trading services).

To determine which firms warrant recognition in this inaugural roster of the region’s Best Brokerages, we began by identifying those firms that rank in all three surveys: the Latin America Research Team, the Latin America Sales Team and the Latin America Trading Team.

Fifteen sell-side institutions were deemed eligible for best-brokerage consideration. We reranked these 15 in each of the three components, totaled the ranks to determine an overall score for each firm, then ranked them in inverse order on the basis of these scores; the lower the score, the higher the position in the brokerage ranking.

When these aggregated totals are further screened by the country in which each firm is based, BTG Pactual captures another title — Brazil’s Best Brokerage — and LarrainVial Corredora de Bolsa is deemed Chile’s Best Brokerage. For the purposes of this ranking, global banks headquartered outside Latin America are considered domiciled in the country in which their primary Latin America operations are based.

Latin America’s Best Brokerages is based on results of the 2012 Latin America Research Team survey, which reflects the opinions of nearly 800 individuals at 400 institutions globally managing an estimated $397.7 billion in Latin America equities and $162 billion in Latin America fixed-income assets; the Latin America Sales Team, which is based on responses from participants at 86 percent of those institutions; and the Latin America Trading Team, which is based on responses from individuals at 69 percent of those buy-side firms.

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