Writing around analysts

One of the bigger problems new writers to Latin Trade face is how to write a story without their standby sources: analysts. I have nothing against these folks personally. (Even the ones who went to jail in the last few years for lying to journalists -- and by extension shareholders -- on a daily basis.) But they don't belong in your story. There are some economics pieces that might call for a general economist, perhaps, and we do some economic shorts that rely on commentary from ratings agencies, but your company story should "expert free" so to speak. That means, unless your expert is central to the story, no financial analysts, no academics, no consultants.

Get involved with people who have money on the table. Executives, customers, employees, unionists, shareholders, suppliers. They will be interesting, much more interesting.

Why? Because, like any outsider, experts have nothing to lose talking to you, and they are pretty much tempted to make more of things than they really are. Plus, it's all boilerplate, stuff any journalist knows or could find out, so talking to them becomes way to source a story without having to dig, that is, without having to do any actual journalism.

Bottom line: boring. Here's a clip from Business Week in which the writer manages to get around the problem by talking to... actual people. The owner. His friends. An industry supplier. A former colleague of the owner. He does mention analysts, and clearly talked to them, but no quotes.

The "Newsweek" problem

Although I'm not convinced Newsweek was in error, despite their retraction, the problem of anonymous sources -- a longstanding problem at U.S. major media outlets -- has finally caused them some serious headaches.

To reiterate, Latin Trade policy is:

Sources should be balanced

Talk to participants (executives, suppliers, customers, partners, regulators, investors) not observers (academics, pols, analysts, professional commentators of any type). If your story is going to raise a certain point-a company has been hurt by a competitor, some member of the board is a loose cannon-we have to get them on the record or take such pains to do so we can legitimately say, "Sr. Fulano declined to comment." I have no problem saying you're ugly as I long as I say you're ugly to your face. We do not publish off-the-record interviews except in extreme circumstances (life in danger); we do not publish charges without offering the company or individual space in the same story to respond. We have these policies for the same reason the parks service does not want you to feed bears: They'll come to expect it, and then we have trouble. It's tough, but that's journalism.

Information gathered at press conferences should be identified so, as in "Slim told reporters Tuesday...." Likewise, one-on-one or exclusive interviews with big fish get played up big, too, as in "In an exclusive interview with Latin Trade, Slim said...."

Always rely on primary source material. Information cribbed from local media is verboten (errors, slant, false reporting and outright propaganda is the risk) and reusing wire stories is also verboten (usually, the problem here is errors). Find out. Call the company. Get the press release. Read the financial filings. Be a reporter. Parrots I do not need.

More on the unintended consequences of change and although I've never thought much of Al Neuharth (USA Today founder), here's right about this.

Writing the logistics story

What could be more boring than a port story?

That, unfortunately, is the view most Latin Trade writers seem to take, and it's a bad starting point. Ports, highways and airports are the big story in Latin America, for now and the foreseeable future. Trade is booming, commodities are rocking and the region's economies are increasingly dependent on getting the goods out to sea fast.

If you're having trouble imaging how to write the piece, get the numbers in hand first. Your national ports regulator or public works ministry should have them, and ECLAC runs an entire Web site about it, as well as does the OAS's ports organization (Latin Trade publishes their magazine, CIP.)

Or just read Latin Trade. Mexico Correspondent Marisol Rueda does a bang-up job on a straightforward idea: Mexico is finally dumping money into its ports in hopes of being able to handle increasing trade. They key move on her part was getting the big number: Lazaro Cardenas port is planning to move 1.8 million tons in the near future; Mexico total port capacity at the moment is just 2 million tons. Impressive stuff. Add in the insider interviews, and you have a fascinating look at just how vital moving the stuff can be to the national economy. Just ask Brazil.

Writing the short story

A lot of you, for reasons I guess I understand, are shy about writing for our short section, Radar. In practice, a lot of those stories are longer stories that end up being cut down either early in the assignment process or later simply because the final version doesn't have enough weight to justify a full page.

That's too bad, because some of our best stories are shorts born that way and never expected to go beyond 300 words. Take a look at the great short online now by Latin Trade Spanish Editor Andrés F. Velázquez, about a Colombian company branching out into selling clothing to gay men. This story worked in part because it's a startling -- although fairly obvious -- business decision: Sell to people with money. But it also has nice twists, like that it crosses borders (Colombia to USA), involves generations (it's the kids of the owners who are selling the line) and spins forward (flush with success, they are already looking to a broader segment).

Did I mention the part about how we pay more for shorts? You'd think that was enough incentive, but it's worth mentioning just the same. Bring on your funny, short, but well-reported ideas, please.

Virtual insanity

Okay, it was a lot to take on the challenge of adding three editors and probably quintupling the size of our roster of regular writers, and the toll it has taken on me has been almost unbearable on the accounting side.

So, solution time. Please cease e-mailing invoices to me. You can if you really, really want to, but they won't matter. What does matter is that you enter the invoice data into our new, now operational accounting database online. You'll find it here. For now, it's in English only, but we'll fix that in a couple of weeks.

Some basic directions:

• You'll need an accurate slug (ra mcd0605, etc). Wait for an editor to send you a final readback of your story before invoicing, since stories can move around from month to month, and that can change the slug.
• Go ahead and upload any story or service for which you have NOT yet received a check. Even if it's from two or three months back.
• You'll need your own numbering system for invoices (1,2,3, etc) or the system won't accept your entry.
• Invoice ONCE and ONLY ONCE please. Multiple entries will cause you lots of problems.
• Yes, please use this system for services like proofing and translating. Details, including a new fax number for receipts, you'll find when you enter the database.
  

The rest should be easy to understand. If you need a slug for an older story, please ask me directly for it. Similarly, if you get assigned something that doesn't seem to fit into the system, please just ask me for direction.

Writing the finance story

Our news editor, Forrest Jones, has an MBA. That doesn't mean you couldn't have written his excellent treatment of the effect U.S. accounting regulations are having on Latin American companies.

How did he tackle something as complex as Sarbanes-Oxley? By talking to the right sources. He walked through the TV Azteca case, which was the genesis of the idea. Got a no comment from Azteca's mouthpiece and a great stinging statement from Salinas Pliego ("It's absurd for the SEC to use a Mexican company and Mexican citizens to try to impose U.S. regulations in an extraterritorial manner...") from their official communications. But then he stepped in deep, talking the U.S. stock market regulator itself, a Chilean company CFO and lawyers who tracking the issue for their multinational clients. End result: News you can use, with a nice breaking news sheen from the Azteca side but also real, actionable information from sources close to the issue.

And, as any good story does, it looks forward. One lawyer says the U.S. rules could push Latin American borrowers into the European markets. The CFO suggests that risk ratings are more of an issue than additional hurdles in U.S. capital markets. The seeds for the next story (or two) are already planted.

Welcome intern Rachel Hatzipanagos

Rachel Hatzipanagos (e-mail active as of Wednesday, tomorrow) joins us from the University of Central Florida, where she is journalism major and English lit minor expecting to graduate in 2007. Of Honduran and Greek heritage, she has lived in London and Kuwait. She'll be here all summer as a full-time intern in editorial.

ASBPE, take 3

In my rush to note our fourth win in the ASBPE awards, I failed to mention that former Latin Trade Reporter Michelle Guevara shares in the recognition for Mike Kepp's piece on the Amazon. Guevara pulled off a great Q&A with Brazilian Central Bank President Henrique Meirelles, one of his last with the international press before tax problems took over his life politically, which ran in the feature package alongside Mike's story. Guevara left Latin Trade last year to take a city reporter job at the Rumbo Spanish-language newspaper in San Antonio, Texas. Great job, Michelle!

Welcome Jasper Charles

Charles Newbery in Argentina is welcoming with his wife a new baby boy, Jasper Charles. He arrived on Wednesday morning and weighed in at 3.72 kilos. Charles says sister Chloe, 2, thinks little brother is "ace" and can't get enough of holding and kissing him.

ASBPE, take 2

The judges have finally caught up on all their work, and...

Mike Kepp won an ASBPE nod for his story in April 2004 on Brazil's plan to develop the Amazon, Digging Deep.

If you're keeping track, that's four awards in eight entries this year. We're batting .500 so far.

Congratulations Mike!

Panorama coming to you

I've subscribed a whole bunch of the correspondents to our weekly newsletter Panorama. It should come on Wednesdays, and I've made some gut calls on which of our three languages you would prefer. (If you want a different language, just ask.)

If you don't see it on Wednesday, might be I've skipped you, or used the wrong e-mail. In any case, just send me a note with your e-mail and tell me want language you want.

The newsletter is useful in that, I've found, it helps you connect to the real news in the region, and you can begin to see how stories might be regionalized. For instance, a group of Mexican companies is trying to de-list from the New York Stock Exchange. They blame tougher U.S. accounting rules. Might be sour grapes; the billionaire who controls the companies is under investigation by the SEC right now, and he ain't happy about that. Or, you might start hearing similar rumbling among your own, local companies. Sounds like a story.

Also, if you see funky stuff -- accents gone screwy, spaces out of whack, formatting weirding out -- please let me know ASAP. Likewise, if your Panorama e-mails end up in your Bulk or Spam boxes, that would be nice to know too. Some of you are on big, Web-based e-mail systems, so a check on quality as these come out is always welcome. We're moving toward opt-in systems, but unless people tell us what they see or don't see, we have no idea.

The race is, uh, on...

"From Hispanic Network and Latin Trade to Hispanic Magazine and LATINA Style, the race is intensifying to attract the interest of Hispanic professionals largely ignored by the mainstream media."

This from HISPANIC BUSINESS Magazine. Actually, I spend a lot of time explaining to PR folks that we're not about Hispanic anything, we're about Latin America. And if this is a race, we got a 12-year head start. But any mention is a good mention. We're not proud. We'll take it.