Source: Fuerza Publica Black Market, Black Eye - By Edward R. Myers (FSCwire Press Release) - According to Danya Mere, a seasoned investigative journalist writing in Mexico’s newspaper, Reforma, “Canada is not only famous for its maple syrup or for Niagara Falls, it is also famous for producing cigarettes sold in the international market illegally.” This indictment comes after a group of...

SAN JOSE, COSTA RICA--(Marketwired - Nov 23, 2015) - This morning the Costa Rican Investment Promotion Agency (CINDE) announced that San José was the breaking leader of four categories in the "The World's Most Competitive Cities 2015" ranking that analyzes the most competitive cities for investment around the globe. Costa Rica's capital led in Latin America categories like: Best hub for Lif...

Press Release by Linda Negron of the TMF Group - The Costa Rican Department of Social Security (CCSS) has proposed an increase in total contribution to the Disability, Old Age and Death Fund (IVM) from 8.5% to 14%. They have also announced that early retirement will be phased out, while some changes are already in effect beginning this month. Many have cautioned that the Costa Rican pension sys...

Jones Snowboards working in the Costa Rica rainforest Transworld Business News Release - Truckee, CA (Nov 19, 2015) – Jones Snowboards is proud to announce a partnership with the non-profit rainforest reforestation project Association Community Carbon Trees (ACCT). ACCT has spent the last twelve years fighting against climate change by reforesting clear cut swaths of Costa Rican rainforest wit...

Indra Media Release - Indra has signed a contract with the Central American Corporation for Air Navigation Services (COCESNA) to renew the air traffic management systems in the San José Air Control Center and the main international airports in Costa Rica for 12 million dollars. The company will upgrade the systems in the center for the coordination of air traffic in Costa Rica and the towers th...

Panama Canal Panama Canal, Nov 17 (EFE).- Experts attending a three-day International Trademark Association meeting that kicked off here Tuesday will discuss ways to combat the transit of counterfeit goods through the Panama Canal. The Leadership Meeting is "an opportunity to raise awareness about the challenges of combating counterfeiting and to advocate for measures to halt the transshipm...

University of Oxford Press Release - Both Costa Rica and El Salvador launched a national Multidimensional Poverty Index (MPI) on the same day, October 29th. Oxford Poverty & Human Development Initiative (OPHI) co-founder John Hammock and Outreach Technical Director Adriana Conconi participated in these launches, John Hammock in Costa Rica’s capital, San Jose, and Adriana Conconi in San Salv...

Flickr Commons Starting January 2016, all credit and debit cards in Costa Rica must be compliant with the smart chip and PIN technology known as EMV, which stands for Electron-MasterCard-Visa, an international initiative to prevent financial fraud at the consumer level. According to a recent report filed by Krissia Chacon Jimenez of business weekly El Financiero, the Central Bank of Costa R...

Business Wire WESTLAKE VILLAGE, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Dole Food Company, Inc. announced today that its Costa Rican subsidiary Standard Fruit Company of Costa Rica S.A. received the prestigious “Social Responsibility in Action” award and was also recognized as a “Top Winner” in the Community category by the Costa Rican American Chamber of Commerce (AmCham). “Local communities would not re...

Source: Fuerza Publica A foreign woman was taken into custody on Wednesday by law enforcement officers assigned to the inauguration of City Mall, the largest indoor shopping center in Central America, located near the Juan Santamaria International Airport (SJO) in the province of Alajuela. According to a press release issued by Fuerza Publica, the national police force of Costa Rica, the wo...

Wikimedia Commons NEW YORK, NY--(Marketwired - Nov 11, 2015) - Grupo Financiero Ficohsa has been named Bank of the Year and Bank of the Year Honduras in LatinFinance's 2015 Bank of the Year Awards. In Costa Rica, LatinFinance selected BAC San Jose as Bank of the Year. The winners of this year's awards employed nimble strategies that reflected a keen market understanding, focusing on efficie...

Source: Tiendas Ekono The United States may have created the shopping craze known as Black Friday, but retailers in Costa Rica have up the ante with Black November, a month-long celebration to consumption that starts a few weeks ahead of the Friday after Thanksgiving Day. One of the first merchants to roll out Black November in Costa Rica is the department store chain Ekono, a national disc...

Pixabay Public Domain By Alejandro Rincon Moreno Cancun, Mexico, Nov 3 (EFE).- The Internet of Everything has been introduced to 10 percent of the Latin American public, and - although this is a relatively low percentage - it represents a "great advance," a Cisco executive said here Tuesday. "We still don't have that massive use that we would like, but - although it's complicated to find...

Wikimedia Commons ATLANTA, Nov. 2, 2015 /PRNewswire/ -- Equifax Inc., a multinational company in the financial services sector, the Costa Rican Investment Promotion Agency (CINDE) and the Ministry of Foreign Trade of Costa Rica, announced that Equifax Inc. will hire 400 employees in the next three years for its Shared Services Center, from which it will provide support for its operations in 19...

Rainforest in Costa Rica New "Costa Rica Tourism Report Q1 2016" now available at Fast Market Research. We expect positive arrivals growth of 2.4% in 2015, with strong arrivals from North America offsetting declining arrivals from Europe. However, we expect growth to moderate in the medium term, leading to lower levels of investment and development. Costa Rica's tourism market is one of th...

Auxis FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Auxis, a leading management consulting and outsourcing firm, providing both IT and business processing services, announced it is significantly expanding its service center in Costa Rica. Auxis will host an inaugural ceremony on Friday, October 30th, to be attended by the President of Costa Rica as well as important business, government, and communi...

Wikimedia Commons Washington, Oct 26 (EFE).- Ford Motor Co. denied Monday that it decided to shift production from Mexico to the United States as a result of criticism from real estate magnate and Republican presidential hopeful Donald Trump. "Ford has not spoken with Mr. Trump, nor have we made any changes to our plans," a company spokesperson said. "We decided to move the F-650 and F-750 ...

Beach house in Costa Rica Press Release by The Costa Rica Star - October 25, 2015 - It's that time of the year when leading international real estate companies such as RE/MAX begin to take account of their achievements, challenges and housing market figures since the beginning of the year. As it happens, 2015 has been an exciting year for RE/MAX in two key housing markets: the United States an...

Fitch Ratings-New York-22 October 2015: External tailwinds are unlikely to lead to a significant uplift in Central America's creditworthiness, says Fitch Ratings in a new special report. While external finances and inflation across the region have benefited from the U.S. recovery and lower oil prices, the outlook for growth, public finances and structural issues is more mixed. Nonetheless, the new...

CHANTILLY, Va., Oct. 21, 2015 /PRNewswire/ -- Engility Holdings, Inc. (NYSE: EGL), today announced the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) has awarded the company a five-year contract with a potential value of  $35 million to provide technical and administrative support to the Latin America and Caribbean (LAC) Regional Office of USAID's Office of Foreign Disaster Assistance ...

Source: Flickr Commons TechSci Research Press Release -- Burnaby, British Columbia - According to TechSci Research report, “Costa Rica Tyre Market Forecast & Opportunities, 2020”, the tyre market in Costa Rica is forecast to grow during 2015-20, on account of expanding vehicle fleet and upcoming government reforms to boost growth in construction and transportation sector. Bridgestone Tyre ...

Ft. Lauderdale, FL (PRWEB) October 20, 2015 -- Auxis, a leading provider of management consulting and back office outsourcing services, announced today that Raul Vega, its Founder and CEO, will serve as Chairperson for the upcoming Shared Services & Outsourcing Week, October 26-28 in Miami. “SSOW LatAm is a major event in this space, and I’m looking forward to helping attendees, clients and...

Photo of a previous Expotur conference in Costa Rica ICT Press Release - September marked the beginning of international tourism fairs, which have become a showcase for the promotion of Costa Rica around the world. This year alone, the Costa Rican Tourism Board (Spanish initials: ICT) along with other tourism companies, participated in 14 meetings held in the main tourism source markets for Co...

Conceptual drawing by APM Terminals APM Terminals Press Release. Moin, Costa Rica – APM Terminals Moin has announced a number of port project updates enabling Costa Rica’s future economic growth needs through a safe, world-class, high-productivity and environmentally-sustainable container terminal designed to serve the larger vessels entering the Latin American trades, and in particular, the t...

A last-ditch effort by the government of Costa Rica to control the pesky deficit may not work as intended and may also force the appreciation of the United States dollar (USD) against the local currency. The administration of President Luis Guillermo Solis recently pitched an investment idea to the government of the People's Republic of China (PRC). The idea consisted of a bond package speciall...

From 2016 to 2020, retail coffee giant Starbucks plans to open 15 more cafes in Costa Rica, a business move that will generate more than 300 jobs. Such was the statement made by Monica Bianchini, general manager of Starbucks in Costa Rica, as she inaugurated the 8th location in our country. According to a news report filed by Marvin Barquero for national newspaper La Nacion, Ms. Bianchini expla...

TORONTO, ON--(Marketwired - October 13, 2015) - For the second year in a row, Scotiabank is the only Canadian-based company named on the "World's Best Multinational Workplaces" list by the Great Place to Work® Institute. Companies are chosen for the World's Best Multinational Workplaces list predominantly based on data gathered from employee surveys and direct comments from employees. As in ...

Tegucigalpa, Oct 11 (EFE).- The National Banks and Securities Commission, or CNBS, of Honduras ordered the "forced liquidation" of Banco Continental, which stands accused by the United States of money laundering and supporting drug trafficking, the Honduran bank announced on the weekend after proposing to regulatory authorities that it be allowed to "voluntarily liquidate" instead. The decision...

The strengthening of the United States dollar (USD) and the weakening of a few international economies are factors creating bargains for North American and European medical tourists. A recent article by Christiana Sciaudone of BloombergBusiness examined how currency devaluation is creating bargains for medical tourists in Brazil: “Danniella Gomes is about to head home to Brasilia from Texas to ge...

DUBLIN--(BUSINESS WIRE) -- Research and Markets has announced the addition of the "Governance, Risk and Compliance - The Costa Rican Insurance Industry" report to their offering. The 'Governance, Risk and Compliance - The Costa Rican Insurance Industry' report is the result of extensive research into the insurance regulatory framework in Costa Rica. It provides detailed analysis of the insur...

From September 23rd to the 25th, Costa Rica’s National Ecotourism and Sustainable Chamber (Spanish acronym: CANAECO) hosted the International Conference: Planet, People, Peace (P3) at the Children’s Museum in San Jose. P3 was sponsored by Costa Rica Tourism Board (Spanish initials: ICT), and it focused on addressing issues including social development through tourism, climate change adaptation, wa...

SAN SALVADOR, El Salvador--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Solid capital positions, high dollarization, stable customer deposits, good liquidity and sustainable asset quality underpin the largest private banks in Costa Rica, according to Fitch Ratings. With the addition of strong parental support, BAC, Scotiabank and Davivienda's national ratings are well anchored. 'Despite the prospects of a less dynamic eco...

Recent public opinion surveys conducted by the Investigative Center of Political Science of the University of Costa Rica suggest that the administration of President Luis Guillermo Solis is not the most popular at the moment, particularly in matters related to the national economy. According to reports filed by Ernesto Rivera of the weekly Semanario Universidad, 70 percent of voters in Costa Ri...

SAN JOSE, COSTA RICA--(Marketwired - Sep 23, 2015) - Bosch Service Solutions, a leading supplier of Business Process Outsourcing, expands its global network with the opening of its first business service center in Costa Rica on September 23th. The site will provide business support in finance, accounting and technical operations for the Bosch Group in North America as well as technical support for...

New York, September 18, 2015 -- Moody's Investors Service, ("Moody's") assigned a provisional rating of (P) Ba2 to Aeris Holdings Costa Rica S.A. de C.V.'s issuance of approximately US $127 million of senior notes ("Notes"). Proceeds will be used to refinance the outstanding loans consisting of roughly $89 million obtained in 2011 from Overseas Private Investment Corporation and Inter-American Dev...

San Diego, California (PRWEB) September 15, 2015 -- Mexico Soft Landing company Co-Production International (CPI), is releasing a white paper, “Checklist: The Top 7 Criteria for Choosing a Medical Device Manufacturing Location”, at the American Medical Device Summit 2015 that will be held in Chicago on September 21-22, 2015. As Manufacturing Expansion Experts, CPI provides a range of site selec...

Pro Surfer Emily Gussoni from Costa Rica The National Surfing Team of Costa Rica made history earlier this year by bringing back the most gold medals from the World Surfing Games (WSG) in Nicaragua. Now the Surfing Federation of Costa Rica (Spanish acronym: FEDESURF) has an opportunity to host the next WSG in 2016, but there is no money to do so. According to a recent news report filed by J...

New York, Sep 15 (EFE; additional reporting by The Costa Rica Star).- Hewlett Packard on Tuesday announced that it intends to lay off up to 30,000 workers to help cut costs by some $2.7 billion. The tech giant made the announcement in a communique issued from San Jose, California, which listed a series of measures to be taken to restructure the business group. The move was announced during a...

The Greenback The currency exchange rate between the United States dollar (USD) and the Costa Rica colón (CRC) in recent days has registered an uptick in favor of the greenback; however, some analysts believe that this is a trend that may not last too long. High trading volumes in the MONEX, a national trading platform that provides direct access to foreign currency exchange (forex) investo...

Market and industry research firm Canadean recently announced the availability of its latest report: Costa Rica Beer Market Insights 2015. SUMMARY The beer market saw growth in 2014 with low priced imports help fuel demand. The market remains a virtual monopoly but craft beer saw strong growth. Imports increased due to a key demographic favoring imported beer. Craft beer saw growth through c...