Banco Nacional branch in Liberia, Costa Rica New York, April 07, 2016 -- Moody's Investors Service has assigned a Ba1 foreign currency senior unsecured debt rating to Banco Nacional de Costa Rica (BNCR)'s proposed US dollar senior note issuance for an expected amount of US$500 million. The instrument will be governed by the laws of the State of New York. The outlook on the rating is negative,...

EFE/File Washington, Apr 3 (EFE).- The largest journalistic leak in history, which came to light on Sunday with the participation of the Washington-based International Consortium of Investigative Journalists, suggests that 140 politicians and officials from around the globe, including 72 former and current world leaders, have connections with secret "offshore" companies to escape tax scrutiny ...

Pixabay Commons During a February speaking engagement at United Nations Association of New York, renowned author Sasha Issenberg offered a glimpse at the current state of medical tourism:   Some countries have found economic opportunity in turning healthcare into a global business. with insurance can expect to pay $90,000 for a heart bypass in the U.S., but only $12,000 if he or she ...

Screenshot of INS webpage MEXICO CITY--(BUSINESS WIRE)--A.M. Best has affirmed the financial strength rating of A- (Excellent) and the issuer credit rating of “a-” of Instituto Nacional de Seguros (INS) (San Jose, Costa Rica). The outlook for each of these ratings remains stable. The ratings reflect INS' strong capitalization, supported by a comprehensive and adequate reinsurance program, g...

Banco Popular branch in Cuidad Quesada, built by Edificadora Beta Fitch Ratings-New York-31 March 2016: Fitch Ratings has affirmed Banco Popular y de Desarrollo Comunal's (BPDC) long-term foreign currency Issuer Default Rating (IDR) and local currency long-term IDR at 'BB+'. The Rating Outlook is Negative. Fitch has also affirmed the bank's short-term foreign currency IDR and short-term local ...

Ronald McDonald sits in the Netherlands. Source: Wikimedia Commons New York, Mar 31 (EFE).- McDonald's Corp. plans to open approximately 1,300 fast food restaurants in China over the next five years, CEO Steve Easterbrook said. The top exec at the U.S. multinational said in an interview with The Wall Street Journal that the firm wants to make China its second largest market worldwide, behin...

(Wikimedia Commons) LONDON--(BUSINESS WIRE)--According to Technavio’s latest report, the global contact center market is expected to reach USD 9.7 billion by 2019, growing at a CAGR of over 9% during the forecast period. “The global contact center market has been registering a positive growth rate for the past five years, and this growth is expected to gain momentum in the coming years. Inn...

Source: Ad Astra Rocket Co. – Ad Astra Rocket Company, Costa Rica's most renowned aerospace firm, is currently generating 100% of its operating power requirement with renewable solar energy. The milestone was achieved in mid-March as the company’s new 76.86 kW solar array was formally connected to the facility and certified by representatives from Costa Rica’s electric power utility (ICE)....

Bionovelus The Hemileia vastatrix fungus, “roya” or “coffee rust,” can be devastating when conditions are especially favorable for rapid growth. The coffee rust has increased in 2015 mainly due to climate change. The economic impact is over $2.5 billion per year, along with over 500,000 jobs lost in Costa Rica and across Central America, and an increase of illegal immigration to the USA. Co...

Wikimedia Commons San Rafael, Alajuela, Costa Rica, March 21, 2016 --(PR.com)-- On Thursday,  the Public Services Regulatory Authority (Spanish acronym: ARESEP) held its final public meeting on the pricing structure for the new distributed solar program. It is scheduled to open with compliance of the power companies in Costa Rica April 7th, 2016. I.C.E., the main power company, and Acesolar, t...

Wikimedia Commons Miami, Florida. March 2016. Minority Chamber of Commerce announces a new Speaker confirmation at the Global Conference, “Doing Business with the World Miami 2016” on March 30 at the Renaissance Banquet Hall located at 5910 SW 8 Street in Miami. Mr. Zacarías Ayub Rojas, Trade Representative from Costa Rica will be attending, he will present an overview about opportunities and po...

ICR-CRS Archive/FILE (Pictured: Workers at a multinational medical device manufacturing company's facility in Heredia, Costa Rica) The United Nations (UN) Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC) and Oxfam describe as “appalling” the rate of corporate tax avoidance and evasion by corporations operating in Latin America – particularly in Costa Rica – in a report issued th...

Costa Rican president, Luis Guillermo Solis tours the Reventazon hydroelectric plant while still under construction in 2014. (Casa Presidencial) The first of four turbines at Costa Rica’s Reventazon hydroelectric plant, recently made famous after the discovery of ancient, 12,200-year-old human settlements by workers at the site, is set to come online by the end of the month, according to proje...

(ICR-CRS Archive) Costa Rica’s National Council of Financial System Supervision (Conassif) and financial regulator, SUGEF are working on a new bill that would provide universal deposit insurance for all banks in the country, following a recent recommendation by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD). Currently, depositors in Costa Rica’s state-owned banks, such as ...

Scarlet Macaw Mar. 23, 2016 / PRZen / NEW YORK -- Costa Rica's Institute of Tourism (ICT) will launch its 2016 promotional tour of the United States with visits to San Francisco on March 29, Los Angeles on March 30 and San Diego on March 31. Organized by the Pro Imagen Costa Rica Group, the entity in charge of the country's image as a tourist destination in potential markets, the educationa...

Panama Canal Panama City, Mar 23 (EFE).- The long-delayed inauguration of the expanded Panama Canal will take place on June 26, the administrator of the interoceanic waterway said Wednesday. "After passing some critical tests this past weekend, we concluded that the inauguration date would be June 26 of this year," Panama Canal Authority, or ACP, Administrator Jorge Quijano said. Panaman...

Panama Canal Panama City, Mar 22 (EFE).- The Panama Canal Authority, or ACP, said it would impose new draft restrictions on ships starting April 18 due to a severe drought affecting two artificial lakes that feed the interoceanic waterway. "The maximum allowable draft will be 11.89 meters (39 feet)," the canal's administrator said in a statement Monday. The "temporary and preventative" m...

Nutrivida By Anne Salter. SEUK UK Social Enterprise News Release - As a part of the British Embassy programme ‘Exporting Social Enterprises’, in February 2016 Social Enterprise UK traveled to San Jose to represent the UK social enterprise sector in Costa Rica. The week included conferences, meetings with government, press, charities and social enterprises to discuss the opportunities for the mo...

(Archive/CRS) The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) is urging Costa Rica’s banking regulator known as SUGEF to make the results of tests of the country’s banks that measure their ability to cope with crisis, known as “stress tests,” available to the public. SUGEF periodically conducts stress tests on the country’s banks, but the results of the tests are not made p...

Pixabay Commons WASHINGTON, March 15th, 2016 – The World Bank (WB) Board of Executive Directors approved a US$420 million loan today to support the Costa Rican Social Security Administration’s (CCSS or La Caja, in Spanish) Strategic Agenda to Strengthen Health Insurance (SASHI), with the goal of improving the timeliness and quality of health care and strengthening institutional efficiency. ...

Franklin Chang, Ad Astra Rocket Company San Jose, March 2016. Aiming to put Costa Rica on the world map of aerospace industry, a group of 25 companies in sectors such as electronics, metalworking and specialized services came together to create the Costa Rica Aerospace Cluster (CRAC). This group seeks to position the country as a solution provider for the international aerospace industry. T...

Panama Canal Panama City, Mar 19 (EFE).- Panama's economy will grow 6.1 percent in 2016 and as much as 7 percent in the coming years thanks to the expansion of the canal and low fuel costs, an International Monetary Fund delegation said in this capital. Panama has boasted the region's highest average growth rates over the past decade and will be able to continue expanding at a clip of betwe...

FreeStockPhotos.biz SAO PAULO--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Global banks' departures from Latin America will go on as they attempt to improve their return on capital by changing strategies and lowering their exposure to the risk presented in some Latin American markets, Fitch Ratings says. Citigroup's Brazilian and Argentinean retail banking operations are the latest units for sale that exemplify this tre...

Source: IBIC Ames, Ia. – Iowa beef producers Scott Heater, Wapello, and Dean Black, Somers, participated in an Iowa Meat Trade Mission to Dominican Republic and Costa Rica in late February. Heater, chairman of the Iowa Beef Industry Council, explained that the mission was exploratory in nature to determine if there is additional market opportunities for U.S. quality beef in these Central Ameri...

Source: NUS Earlier this month, the National University of Singapore (NUS) welcomed Costa Rica's Chancellor and Minister of Foreign Affairs Manuel González Sanz. Minister Gonzalez was in Singapore on an official visit to the NUS start-up incubator, Blk71. Minister González was hosted by NUS Enterprise CEO Dr Lily Chan, who gave a presentation on Blk71’s inception and the entrepreneurial pro...

Source: The World Bank Over the next three years, the World Bank is proposing the establishment of a $65 million Catastrophe Deferred Draw Down Option (CAT DDO) for Costa Rica. This CAT DDO is part of the World Bank's Disaster Risk Management scope. According to the World Bank, the overall development objective of the CAT DDO funding is to enhance the capacity of the government of Costa Rica to...

Source: Convergys (San Jose, March 14, 2016) Convergys Corporation (NYSE: CVG), global leader in customer management, revealed the expansion of their business in Costa Rica with a hiring commitment to support their growing customer service and technical operations. This expansion will help Convergys build upon its current staff by adding approximately 500 new highly specialized jobs in Custome...

The Westin in Playa Conchal New York, Mar 14 (EFE).- Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide, Inc., owner of the Sheraton and Westin chains, said Monday it received an unsolicited $12.8 billion takeover bid from a consortium led by Chinese insurance company Anbang. In Costa Rica, Starwood operates the all-inclusive Westin Golf Resort & Spa in Playa Conchal, Cabo Velas, province of Guana...

(Archive) COSTA RICA STAR FINANCIAL NEWS BRIEF Costa Rica’s economy grew by 4.9 percent in the 12 months leading up to January, according to the latest data of the Monthly Economic Activity Index (IMAE), a rolling monthly measurement of annual (year on year) economic growth produced by Costa Rica’s Central Bank. January also marks the seventh consecutive month of economic growth in Costa...

Source: Discovery Havana, Mar 12 (EFE).- Cuba has welcomed 1 million foreign tourists to date in 2016, a 14.6 percent surge over the same period last year, the Tourism Ministry, or Mintur, reported. The year in course has been characterized by "continuous growth" in the number of tourists to Cuba from such markets as Germany, Britain, the United States, France, Italy and Argentina, a Mintur...

NAPERVILLE, Ill.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Coriant, a global supplier of SDN-enabled end-to-end transport networking solutions, today announced that Red Centroamericana de Telecomunicaciones (REDCA), a provider of carrier neutral telecommunications services in Central America, has deployed the Coriant® hiT 7300 Multi-Haul Transport Platform to cost-efficiently scale its regional transport network and supp...

(FILE/ARCHIVE. Photo courtesy of Conarroz.) Costa Rica’s rice growers are urging President Luis Guillermo Solis against joining the Pacific Alliance, a Latin American trade bloc which currently consists of its four founding member states: Chile, Colombia, Mexico, and Peru. Costa Rica began the process of accession to become the Alliance’s fifth full member state in 2014 during the administr...

(ICR/CRS Archive) On Wednesday, just one day after leaders of Costa Rica’s agricultural sector warned that some 500,000 jobs could be at risk should the country decide to move forward with plans for full membership in the Pacific Alliance, Costa Rica’s industrial and manufacturing leaders came out in support of the pact, saying that the Alliance would expand trade and access to international m...

Some 500,000 jobs in Costa Rica could be at risk should the country decide to move forward with plans for full membership in the Pacific Alliance, a Latin American trade bloc which currently consists of its four founding member states: Chile, Colombia, Mexico, and Peru, agro leaders warned Tuesday. Costa Rica began the process of accession to become the Alliance’s fifth full member state in 201...

A consortium comprising Ineco-ACCIONA Ingeniería and the Costa Rica Ministry of Public Works and Transport (MOPT) have signed an agreement for the provision of consulting services for the administrative, technical, legal and environmental management of the Transport Infrastructure Program (PIT) launched by the Costa Rica Government. Its objective is to modernise road and port infrastructures in th...

Source: UNDP United Nations Development Programme Press Release - One of the world’s biggest pineapple producing countries – Costa Rica – has officially adopted a widely endorsed action plan to tackle serious social and environmental concerns in this critical sector, worth US$ 800 million to the national economy. Agrochemical run-off into water sources is a key issue that the plan will targ...

The United States Department of State submitted the International Narcotics Control Strategy Report (INCSR) to Congress earlier this week, and it included an unflattering report of Costa Rica as a haven for laundering illicit proceeds from drug trafficking and terrorism.   According to the U.S. Department of State:   The two-volume report offers a comprehensive assessment of th...

RyanInc; Flickr Commons The Chairman of the United States Senate Committee on Finance believes that Costa Rica applies a discriminatory excise tax on distilled spirits and alcoholic beverages. For this reason, the Committee is taking a careful look at historical trade agreements so that measures can be taken.   According to an official press release issued by the Committee:  ...

Pixabay Public Domain Widener University Press Release - The lush, coffee-producing landscape of Costa Rica has been a destination for Widener University students and faculty to conduct research and participate in learning experiences for a decade, but the university now has a permanent hub in the Central American country to call home. The university has purchased a four-bedroom villa outfi...

Wikimedia Commons GMB UK Press Release - GMB is calling for Fyffes, the Irish multinational fruit company, to improve working conditions for Honduran and Costa Rican plantation and farm workers and to pay them a living wage. At an advisory meeting to the EU-Central America Association Agreement on March 1st, Bert Schouwenburg, one of 3 European trade union representatives, condemned Fyffes ...