Argentina has inaugurated a new pro-market president, Mauricio Macri.

Venezuela has elected a two-thirds congressional majority in opposition to leftist President Nicolas Maduro.

And Brazil’s parliament has introduced a resolution of impeachment against its leftist president, Dilma Rousseff.

In short, Latin America’s governance appears to be improving rapidly – and that means there must be a decent chance that its economic performance will improve, as well.

Fortunately, there are a few good ways for U.S. income investors to play this trend.

Most Latin American countries have suffered to some degree from declining commodity and energy prices, but only some have added management mistakes to their problems.

Argentina’s 12 years of spendthrift populism and Venezuela’s foreigner-hostile socialism are the most extreme cases. But even in Brazil, a tradition of excessive government spending – far higher than in most other middle-income countries – has finally caught up with its government.

Mexico, on the other hand, is showing signs of accelerating growth (in spite of the decline in oil prices) after Pemex’s operations were opened to foreign participation.

Elsewhere, Colombia enjoys good management and greatly increased political stability. Both it and Chile should enjoy accelerating growth in 2016 after a period of slower growth in 2014-15, according to the International Monetary Fund (IMF).

Meanwhile, all Latin American currencies have declined sharply against the dollar. The Mexican peso has dropped by 15% in the last year, the Chilean peso has declined by 12%, the Colombian peso declined by 28%, and the Brazilian real has dropped by 31%.

That has allowed some Latin American companies to enjoy large earnings gains, especially if they’re exporting in dollars and have costs largely denominated in local currency.

It has also meant that the small “hedged” Latin American exchange-traded funds (ETFs) – like Deutsche X-Trackers MSCI Brazil Hedged Equity Fund (DBBR), a $3.5 million fund whose assets are hedged back into dollars – have outperformed conventional funds.

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