Claro Jamaica’s parent company, América Móvil , was ranked “7th place among 10 global growth titans” and 18th place in BusinessWeek’s ‘World’s Best Companies 2009’ last month.

The assessment, by management consulting firm A T Kearney, was of the top 40 companies in the world which are thriving in the recession. Amazon.com was 17th place.

In the article, A T Kearney stated that “…América Móvil is the world’s fourth largest cellular carrier with more than 190 million subscribes.”

The top 40 companies come from 18 countries worldwide, but América Móvil, was the only company from the Latin American Region. The rankings of the companies were decided through examination of the 2,500 largest publicly listed companies in the world by A.T. Kearney. The companies were ranked based on sales growth and value creation, which is the rise of market capitalisation after subtracting any increase in capital, over five years. América Móvil registered nearly US$25 billion in sales in 2008.

The BusinessWeek article, further said that América Móvil had profited by expanding into the developing markets of Latin America and the Caribbean. One of the company’s most recent forays has been the purchase of Oceanic Digital Jamaica, rebranded as Claro, one of its most popular brands.

Reacting to the news, Claro Jamaica, has expressed pride and pleasure in the recent ranking.

“We in Jamaica,” states the company, “are proud of the strides we have so far made in growing the company in Jamaica. Claro Jamaica is credited with adding over 92,500 subscribers to the network throughout the September 2009 quarter alone, which is more than half to the 185,000 new wireless subscribers to Claro Caribbean in the last quarter.”

This type of growth reaffirms Claro Jamaica’s solid standing in the telecommunications industry and further confirms that the discerning Jamaican consumer is excited to experience the higher quality of the Claro 3G Network. In affordable prices and this is evidenced by the company’s growth which is approximately three times that of its nearest competitor.

Argentina looks to re-enter global credit markets

Argentine lawmakers on Wednesday gave the government permission to enter talks with investors holding US$20 billion the country’s defaulted bonds, in a bid to re-enter global credit markets.

Lawmakers passed the government-backed bill, which could see Argentina whittle down its defaulted debt and reenter the global financial mainstream.

By 45 votes to 10, senators opted to unfreeze a suspended 2005 debt restructuring offer that, at the time, promised investors 45-75 per cent of their money back after the country defaulted.

The Argentine government of President Cristina Kirchner also said it wants to make a new proposal for the exchange of shares from “hold-out” private creditors who refused to agree to renegotiate the debt in June 2005.

At that time, Argentina negotiated a debt exchange of some 76 per cent, or US81.8 billion, but hundreds of other creditors, holding 23.85 per cent, declined.

Argentina has been excluded from global capital markets since December 2001, when the country suffered a precipitous economic collapse wiping out personal savings, shredding government finances and prompting Buenos Aires to default on its debt.

Since then, and up to the global financial crisis last year, the country has tackled that debt mountain and the damage to its credit image, helped by gross domestic product growth of around eight percent a year thanks to demand for its commodities, particularly soya.

Argentina is facing payments in 2010 of US$13 billion on its maturing debt, after paying US$20 billion this year.

Apart from its obligations to private creditors, the country also owes the Paris Club of creditor nations US$6.5 billion.

Argentina’s total debt, not counting that held by the hold-outs, is more than US$140 billion, equivalent to 50 per cent of gross domestic product.