Red Eléctrica: power outage - FT.com One swallow may not make a spring, but two Latin American nationalisation gulps in less than a month may give investors pause for thought. Tuesday's move by Evo Morales, Bolivia's president, to take over the local electricity transmission subsidiary of Spain's Red Eléctrica sent shares in the Madrid-based parent down more than 2 per cent. This follows last month's pounce by Argentina on 51 per cent of YPF, the former state oil group, which caused a 20 per cent fall in shares of Repsol, its Spanish owner. The situations have some similarities but also big differences. Mr Morales, like Cristina Fernández, Argentina's president, is accusing the Spanish owners of under-investment, and playing domestic politics at the expense of his country's international reputation. But in contrast to Ms Fernandez, the leftist Bolivian president has long said he wants state ownership of "strategic assets." May Day takeovers have become almost ritual: Tuesday's action was a mopping-up operation. The economic value at stake in Red Eléctrica's case is also far less significant. The book value of its Bolivian business is only about 1 per cent of market capitalisation, reckons UBS, and less than 3 per cent of revenues. YPF represented about a quarter of Repsol's operating income. Meanwhile, La Paz, flush with international reserves, is already hinting at compensation: Madrid, after all, is its biggest aid donor. Still, European utilities, faced with lacklustre demand domestically and oversupply, may become increasingly wary of Latin American diversification. That, sadly, would make everyone a loser - including a region with an aggregate $5.8tn of gross domestic product and where most governments (centrists such as Brazil, Mexico, Chile, Peru, Columbia and Panama) encourage foreign capital and have moved on from atavistic populism.