Latin American shares wobbled on Friday as concerns about weak economic data in China and Europe limited gains and investors looked forward for fresh signs of a brightening US economy. The MSCI Latin American stock index rose 0.42 percent after hitting its lowest point in more than a week on Thursday.
Meantime, both the Mexican IPC index and Brazil's Bovespa traded flat after US data showed single family home sales fell in February but jumped in prices to the highest in eight months. "Today's data in the United States were inconclusive," said Flavio Serrano, senior economist at Espírito Santo Investment Bank in Brazil.
The lack of good news sapped the appetite of investors who have been looking for the United States for indications that its economy is picking up in hopes it could global markets. "What we saw this week was a lot of worries about the indicators showing a deceleration in Europe," said Gonzalo Fernandez, an analyst at Santander in Mexico City. "Next week there are going to be a lot of economic indicators from the United States...that will be very important."
If data shows momentum in the US economy, Mexican stocks could rise, he said. Mexico's IPC stock index hit 14-month highs earlier this week, breaking important resistance levels that analysts say could indicate a further upward trend. The index ended the week up 0.25 percent. It has been trading in a narrow range, near one-year record levels for much of March.
Retailer Wal-Mart Mexico declined 1.02 percent and bottler Femsa dipped 0.20 percent. In Brazil, the Bovespa index slid 2.7 percent for the week, largely on concerns about diminishing demand in China. The fall was the biggest weekly decline since mid-December. Brazilian oil start-up OGX tumbled 4.53 percent after it reported losses of 509.8 million reais ($280.72 million) for 2011. Chile's IPSA stock index ended up 0.67 percent in a low-volume trading session. Industrial conglomerate Copec advanced 1.61 percent.