Institutional Investor has sent ballots to money managers with significant investments in Latin American securities so they can participate in the region’s 2014 surveys, including the Latin America Research Team, the Latin America Executive Team and the All-Brazil Research Team, according to Carolynn B. Tetro, Director of II’s Research Operations Group.
The Latin America Research Team ballot is unchanged from last year and includes 15 industry sectors, five countries and regions and five macroeconomic categories. On the All-Brazil ballot, Consumer Goods was divided into Food & Beverages and Retailing; all other categories remain the same. Details of each ballot appear below.
Voting in the research teams is expected to be particularly intense owing to the tightness of last year’s contests, Tetro predicts. Only one team position separated the top two firms — Itaú BBA and Bank of America Merrill Lynch, respectively — on the 2013 Latin America Research Team. Similarly, on the 2013 All-Brazil Research Team, No. 1 BTG Pactual led second-place Itaú by only one spot — and the latter firm emerged victorious when positions were weighted to reflect their relative values.
The Latin America survey reflected the opinions of more than 810 investment professionals at some 420 buy-side firms with total Latin American assets under management of $418 billion in equities and $265 billion in debt. The Brazil results were based on input from more than 640 buy-siders at nearly 330 money management firms responsible for $230 billion in Brazilian equities and more than $167 billion in Brazilian debt.
Competition was equally fierce in last year’s Latin America Executive Team survey, in which analysts on both the buy and sell side were asked to evaluate the corporate executives and companies in their coverage universes. Two Brazil-based companies earned the highest overall scores: CCR, which operates highways, and department store chain Lojas Renner.
Polling for the region’s best researchers will last about four weeks; for the top executives, about eight weeks. Responses will be used to determine the composition of the Latin America Research Team, the Latin America Sales Team, the Latin America Trading Team, the Latin America Executive Team, the All-Brazil Research Team, the All-Brazil Sales Team and the All-Brazil Trading team. Results of all of these surveys will be published in Research & Rankings in August, with feature coverage of the research, sales and trading teams to follow in the September editions of II magazine and reporting on the Latin America Executive Team in the November issues.
The following industry sectors appear on this year’s Latin America Research Team ballot: Agribusiness; Capital Goods; Cement & Construction; Electric & Other Utilities; Financials/Banks; Financials/Nonbanks; Food & Beverages; Health Care; Metals & Mining; Oil, Gas & Petrochemicals; Pulp & Paper; Real Estate; Retailing; Technology, Media & Telecommunications; and Transportation. Countries and regions under consideration include Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Mexico and North Andean Countries. The macroeconomic categories are Corporate Debt, Economics, Equity Strategy, Local-Markets Strategy and Sovereign Debt.
The following industry sectors appear on this year’s All-Brazil Research Team ballot: Agribusiness; Capital Goods; Chemicals & Oil; Education: Electric & Other Utilities; Financials/Banks; Financials/Nonbanks; Food & Beverages; Health Care; Metals & Mining; Pulp & Paper; Real Estate; Retailing; Technology, Media & Telecommunications; and Transportation. The macroeconomic categories are Corporate Debt, Economics and Equity Strategy.