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Ricardo Cavanagh
& team
Itaú BBA
First-place appearances: 2

Total appearances: 3

Team debut: 2011

Ricardo Cavanagh relocated from Buenos Aires to Santiago, Chile, in January, but the Itaú BBA duo he leads doesn’t budge an inch: It occupies the winner’s circle for a second straight year. Argentina remains economically and politically unstable, the 45-year-old contends, noting the roughly 1,200-point spread between U.S. Treasuries and the country’s B-minus sovereign bonds. For equity investors with a stomach for risk, “bank stocks would be our first choice,” Cavanagh says. “They should be the first to react to the upside whenever sovereign bonds’ spreads start compressing.” Preferred name? Buenos Aires–based Grupo Financiero Galícia, which has an “extensive branch system covering the entire country, serving everybody from big corporations to midsize farmers,” he explains. “It has an excellent reputation and a clean balance sheet, with no exposure to high risk. It’s a great bank in the wrong zip code.” Other favored companies include real estate conglomerate Inversiones y Representaciones Sociedad Anónima and telecommunications services provider Telecom Argentina, both of which are headquartered in Buenos Aires. Should the country get its act together, “potentially there’s tremendous upside in these stocks — all of them could double by 2015,” believes Cavanagh, who also oversees the crew that takes third place for coverage of Chile. “Nobody else has his 20 years’ experience,” applauds one backer. “Even when others gave up on Argentina, Cavanagh stayed. He’s seen it all.” — Paul Sweeney