ABSTRACT
Spanish direct investment in Latin America increased significantly in absolute terms, especially after the privatization programs instituted by many Latin American governments. Latin American and Caribbean states suppressed the Spanish monopolistic export-import guilds and resident Spanish merchants were thrown out or deemed unwelcome. In the first half of the nineteenth century, Puerto Rico, like Cuba, produced mainly agricultural goods and manufactures that could not be provided by Spain or by other industrialized nations. Spanish direct investment in the nineteenth century in Cuba and Puerto Rico followed the same pattern observed throughout the colonial period. Spanish foreign direct investment in Latin America and the Caribbean in the 1970s and 1980s included investment in distribution networks, which served Spanish exports into the region. The Consulado collected commission fees from merchants and maintained official contact with designated ports in the Caribbean, like Cartagena, Portobello, Panama and Veracruz.
