Trinidad & Tobago´s Prime Minister Patrick Manning will lead an initiative to change the conditions of the oil supply agreement between Venezuela and Caribbean countries later this month.
A report in the local press indicate that Trinidad, Barbados and Jamaica will ask Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez to reconsider some of the terms of the PetroCaribe agreement that the governments say run contrary to the spirit of the CARICOM treaty.
The U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT) granted this week antitrust immunity to a three-way alliance of American Airlines, LAN Peru and Chile´s LAN Airlines.
The immunity allows for coordinated marketing and pricing, but the DOT excluded revenue pooling or pricing, inventory and yield-management coordination for Miami-Lima, where American Airlines and LAN Peru have the only nonstop flights.
Starwood Hotels & Resorts has boosted its stock-repurchase program by $1 billion, bringing the total current authorization to $1.3 billion.
Before the start of trading Tuesday, White Plains, N.Y.- based Starwood also said its board approved the repatriation of about $550 million from the company´s Italian subsidiary and expects to pay about 10% of it in taxes.
Travelzoo has reported revenues of $13.4 million for the third quarter ended September 30, 2005, an increase of 41 percent over revenues of $9.5 million for the prior-year period.
The company attributed the growth to its subscriber base in the US and venture in the UK. Travelzoo UK began operations in May 2005.
Brazilian central bank president Henrique Meirelles said the country´s rate of economic expansion would accelerate next year and that growth is now “sustainable.”
South America´s largest economy grew 3.9 percent from a year earlier in the second quarter and 2.8 percent in the first quarter, slowing from 4.9 percent growth last year.
Peru´s economy grew in August at the fastest annual rate since 1998, as benchmark interest rates near record lows lure investment from Mexican billionaire Carlos Slim and companies such as Hunt Oil Co.
Growth in the 12 months through August quickened to 5.9 percent from 5.9 percent in July and 3.8 percent a year earlier, the government said. The pace of annual expansion was the fastest since at least March 1998, when the economy grew 6 percent.