KINGSTON, Jamaica - The World Bank’s Regional Vice President for Latin America and the Caribbean, Carlos Felipe Jaramillo, has ended a three-day visit to Jamaica discussing a wide range of issues with officials here including digital transformation, reimagining education, increasing climate resilience, improving linkages between agriculture and the tourism sector, as well as urban resilience.

NEW YORK & PHILADELPHIA-- Inclusiv and Comcast Corporation today announced that Comcast has committed to invest $10 million specifically aimed at building equity in credit unions led by and/or serving people of color through Inclusiv’s Racial Equity and Resilience Investment Fund (“the Fund”). Launched in 2020, the Fund leverages investments to increase lending to minority-owned businesses, homeowners, and consumers, providing access to capital and new financial opportunity to traditionally underserved and underbanked communities. As Inclusiv’s first corporate investment, Comcast’s commitment will enable local financial institutions to deploy at least $200 million in total capital in communities that need it the most and help ensure hardworking individuals have access to the capital needed to build and strengthen their financial lives.

BRIDGETOWN, Barbados, CMC – Barbados Tuesday announced that it would be cutting by 50 per cent, airport taxes for regional travelers, a request that had originally been made by Antigua and Barbuda’s Prime Minister Gaston Browne as a means of encouraging intra-regional travel.

CHICAGO,  - On July 1, Channing Capital Management, LLC (Channing) launched its first publicly traded mutual fund, the Channing Intrinsic Value Small-Cap Fund (Ticker: OWLLX). The investable universe is primarily domestic small capitalization stocks with a focus on quality companies that the portfolio management team believes to be attractively valued.

KINGSTON, Jamaica – The Jamaica government says it remains “cautiously optimistic” that the local economy will register significant growth grow this year.

WASHINGTON, D.C. – The World Bank Vice President for the Latin America and the Caribbean, Carlos Felipe Jaramillo, Friday said that the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic has hit the Latin American and Caribbean (LAC) region hard and that economies contracted more in 2020 than at any other time in over a century.

ST. JOHN’S, Antigua – Caribbean Community (CARICOM) leaders are expected to meet before the end of July as they seek to adopt a common position on the decision by the G20 Finance Ministers for a minimum global corporate tax rate.

KINGSTON, Jamaica – The Governor of the Bank of Jamaica (BOJ), Richard Byles, says plans are being finalized for the pilot implementation of the proposed central bank digital currency (CBDC) in August.

GEORGETOWN, Guyana – Eco (Atlantic) Oil and Gas Limited Monday said that the Jabilo-1 well, in the Canje Block, drilled by the US-oil giant, ExxonMobil,  is dry and will be plugged and abandoned.

BRIDGETOWN, Barbados – The Barbados government says it will be taking over the BDS$80 million (One BDS dollar=US$0.50 cents) of debt of the operators of the state-owned Hilton Barbados Hotel, even as the opposition the government’s ability to meet its debt obligations in the foreseeable future given “the persistent absence of any significant platform of growth being constructed”

PORT OF SPAIN, Trinidad –The Trinidad and Tobago government Monday said that the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic has had an impact on both oil and gas production here.

ST. JOHN’S, Antigua – Antigua and Barbuda is to table a proposal Friday urging regional governments to support an initiative to reduce significantly reduce the taxes for air travel in a bid to encourage intra-regional travel as the threat from the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic declines.