Latin American Currencies: Colombia Peso Drops on Lehman Filing

By Andrea Jaramillo

Sept. 15 (Bloomberg) -- Colombia's peso fell, trading near a nine-month low, amid reduced investor's appetite for emerging- market assets after Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. filed for bankruptcy.

Colombia's peso slid 1.3 percent to 2,077 per dollar at 9:56 a.m. New York time, from 2050.55 on Sept. 12, according to the Colombian foreign-exchange electronic transactions system, known as SET-FX. The currency on Sept. 11 touched 2,105, its weakest since November.

The yield on Colombia's benchmark 11 percent bonds due in July 2020 rose 12 basis points, or 0.12 percentage point, to 11.7 percent, according to Colombia's stock exchange. The bond's price dropped 0.733 centavo to 95.553 centavos per peso.

The fourth-largest U.S. investment bank succumbed to the subprime mortgage crisis, filing a Chapter 11 petition with U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Manhattan today. The 158-year-old firm was forced into bankruptcy after Barclays Plc and Bank of America Corp. abandoned takeover talks yesterday.

To contact the reporter on this story: Andrea Jaramillo in Bogota at ajaramillo1@bloomberg.net