It was quite a party for the new office in Coral Gables, Florida, a wealthy and genteel town of 43,000 where the median home sells for $710,000 and the average household income is above $50,000.
Contrast this with Honduras, one of the poorest countries in the western hemisphere, with a per-capita income of $2900 – and a capital, Tegucigalpa, where environmentalists and town planners have yet to make much of a mark since Hurricane Mitch struck in 1998 – and the surreal aspect of Ficohsa’s overseas venture becomes apparent.
As the bank’s press release makes clear: “[The office will serve] as a liaison between potential customers in the US and the bank’s head office in Honduras; the international representative office is prohibited from engaging in banking activities.”
So why was its opening so important, given that Ficohsa already has a successful remittance business in the US? The answer tells us much about central American/US relations. While the Central American Free Trade Agreement augurs well for the future, the fact is that US/central American relations are not always of the warmest kind.
Ficohsa had to jump through hoops to satisfy the US federal and state regulators that it was fit to open even a representative office and it is the first privately owned central American bank to receive a licence.
As Ficohsa executive Gerardo Zanabria says: “It’s like a [Honduran] embassy in the US. It’s very significant. We are the first Honduran bank to open [a representative office] in the US and we had to get federal permission to do it.”
