Latin American Capital Markets

HUMAN CAPACITY DEVELOPMENT 469spective of geographic or jurisdictional differences. Unfortunately, there is a paucity ofinformation in the public domain for using this model to determine the current stateof affairs of human capital development for capital markets in Latin America and theCaribbean. Therefore, this chapter provides only a snapshot of the sector in the region.Although exogenous factors play a critical role in the development of capitalmarkets, their impacts in the politically and socially diverse context of Latin Americaand the Caribbean are beyond the scope of this report.Countries with Developed Capital MarketsDeveloped countries benefit from an extensive history in financial sector development,a strong focus on public and private sector governance, high per capita earnings,awareness by the business community of the value of investing in the humanresource base, and highly structured educational systems. For example, the OECD(1998) report on human capital investment shows that developed countries such asBelgium, Canada, Sweden, the United Kingdom, and the United States have financialservice sectors in which workers have high literacy levels.The presence of these exogenousfactors in sophisticated formats provides intrinsic expectations on the mannerin which a sector does business and develops its workforce. Because of the sizeof capital markets in these countries, there are enough people to be trained to warrantthe establishment of sector-specific training institutions in each country.There isalso an availability of financial resources for developing professionals critical to sustainingcontinued growth in the sector The OECD (1998) report also shows thatAustralia, Canada, New Zealand, the United Kingdom, and the United States have thehighest participation levels for job-related training.There are a number of key similarities in the developed capital markets profiledhere. First, there are professional associations that provide industry standards andguidelines, training programs and conferences for continuous improvement of professionals,as well as investors in those markets. The intent in this overview is not tocomment on the quality of training programs offered to the market, but to identifythat in fact there exists an infrastructure to deliver these programs to professionalsand investors. Second, the regulatory agencies in these countries play a pivotal role inpublic awareness and investor education. With the focus on safeguarding the rights ofthe investor, the involvement of regulatory agencies in investor education is simplygood practice. A third commonality in these markets is the role of training instituteswhose main products are services that target professionals in capital markets. SomeCopyright © by the Inter-American Development Bank. All rights reserved.For more information visit our website: www.iadb.org/pub