New Stock Index Tracks Hispanic Companies

Investment bank Samuel A. Ramirez & Co. said Tuesday that it had launched a stock index to track the fortunes of Hispanic businesses such as L.A.-based Univision Communications Inc. as they increase their presence in the U.S. economy.

The bank’s Hispanic index tracks the 10 largest and most heavily traded Hispanic companies in the United States and Puerto Rico, based on market value and trading volume.

The bank says it is in talks to launch investment products tracking the index.

“The reason we did the index was to introduce the asset class called the Hispanic market, and to have a benchmark like any other asset class,” said Jay Garcia, managing director at Ramirez & Co., the United States’ largest Hispanic-owned securities firm, founded in 1971.

Companies must have a majority of Hispanic owners or customers to qualify for the index. Businesses in that category have grown strongly in the last few years, despite a slump in the economy and the stock market.

Hispanics have become the largest minority group in the United States, accounting for about 13% of the U.S. population.

The U.S.-based companies in the index are Univision; its leading affiliate, Entravision Communications Corp.; Florida-based broadcaster Spanish Broadcasting System Inc.; Long Beach-based Molina Healthcare Inc.; and MasTec Inc., a Florida-based telecom and energy infrastructure company.

The remainder of the companies in the index are banking and financial firms based in Puerto Rico: R&G; Financial Corp., Popular Inc., Doral Financial Corp., W Holding Co. and First Bancorp.

New York-based Ramirez plans to expand the index to 19 companies. The firm is not the first to start a Hispanic index. This year, the magazine Hispanic Business launched its Hispanic Business Stock index.