Felipe Hirai, Thiago Lofiego BofA Merrill Lynch Global Research
Newcomers Felipe Hirai and Thiago Lofiego of BofA Merrill Lynch Global Research, unranked last year, take third. Backers say Hirai, who also leads the top-ranked crew in Metals & Mining, provides “friendly service” and “consistently sound judgment,” while Lofiego has “great timing” and “in-depth industry knowledge.” The analysts upgraded Empresas CMPC from underperform all the way to buy last September, a few weeks after the first-teamers’ comparable upgrade and at a slightly lower price: 16,100 Chilean pesos. The reason? The company had just announced plans to buy Guaíba, the wood and pulp-producing unit of Brazilian rival Aracruz Celulose, and the analysts believed the acquisition would be “a game changer for CMPC’s growth prospects.” The stock had shot up 54.6 percent, to 24,886 pesos, by mid-June, and the duo downgraded it to neutral, on valuation. It subsequently fell 3.4 percent, to 24,032 pesos, through July.
