Our Thursday Sociedad Media Now newsletter on recent developments in the region’s Economies & Everyday Life
Kast Promised to Balance Chile’s Books. Three Months In, He’s Already Retreating
SANTIAGO, CHILE — Three months after winning Chile’s presidency with 58% of the vote on a promise to zero the fiscal deficit, José Antonio Kast formally abandoned that pledge on June 9 — replacing it with a 1.5 percent GDP target by 2030 — as central government debt climbed to 41% of his own 45% prudential ceiling, approval ratings fell 14 points, fuel subsidies were cut, and students returned to Santiago’s streets for the second consecutive week, raising the first serious questions about whether Latin America’s most watched right-wing government can deliver the fiscal discipline it promised without triggering the kind of social rupture that has ended Chilean governments before.
Venezuela’s Military Is Bombing Gold Mines. The Question Is Who Benefits
BOLÍVAR STATE, VENEZUELA — Venezuela’s military launched a major offensive against illegal gold mining operations in Bolívar state on Tuesday — bombing mines, restricting access, and deploying drones over the Orinoco Mining Arc near the borders with Guyana and Brazil — as rights group Provea warned of extrajudicial killings and arbitrary detentions, the government declined to publicly comment, and analysts said the real purpose of the operation was not security but commercial: clearing criminal organizations from territories that foreign mining investors would need to access before Venezuela can unlock the vast mineral revenues its post-Maduro economic opening strategy depends on.
Latin America Is Sitting on the World’s Most Valuable Geology. Here’s Who’s Winning the Race to Extract It
Latin America holds 60% of the world’s lithium, the largest copper reserves on earth, and the second-largest rare earth reserves after China — a geological endowment that has become the most contested economic asset of the decade as Washington deployed more than $1 billion into regional critical minerals investments since January 2025, China’s CATL committed $5 billion to Argentine lithium processing, and copper demand is projected to outpace global production by 2030, turning the elections of 2026 in Colombia, Peru, and Brazil into proxy battles over which superpower gets to shape the supply chains that will power the global economy for a generation.
