EMERGING MARKETS-Latam currencies fall on technical correction, political jitters

SAO PAULO, April 19 (Reuters) - Latin American currencies fell against the dollar on Thursday, with the Mexican peso and Brazilian real posting the strongest falls, as traders took advantage of an opportunity to make a technical correction amid continued political uncertainty. Both the peso and real had posted strong gains against the greenback on Tuesday and Wednesday. Equities also rose across the region on those days as traders bought back into risky asset that they had previously exited. But in Mexico traders continue to be spooked by the strong performance in opinion polls by Mexican leftist Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador. A late Wednesday poll by polling firm Mitofsky showed him pulling further ahead of his rivals in the run-up to the July 1 presidential election. In Brazil, markets continued to be unsettled by an extremely uncertain political outlook during an election year, with the tactics of the country's left still up in the air following the imprisonment of Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, the presidential front-runner who was jailed earlier in April for corruption. "We see a technical correction after (yesterday's movement)," said Ricardo Gomes da Silva, director of brokerage Correparti Corretora. The peso fell 0.83 percent against the dollar in morning trade, while the real fell 0.49 percent. All other major currencies in the region were down by lesser percentages. Across the region, equities markets were mixed, with no major gainers or losers. Among the biggest index movers on Brazil's benchmark Bovespa index, which had risen 0.23 percent in morning trade, was food processor BRF SA. Shares in BRF were trading up 8.6 percent on Thursday after Pedro Parente, chief executive of state-run oil firm Petroleo Brasileiro SA, said he had accepted an invitation from major shareholders to become the company's new chairman. Key Latin American stock indexes and currencies at 1426 GMT: Stock indexes daily % YTD % Latest change change MSCI Emerging Markets 1184.21 0.69 1.53 MSCI LatAm 3073.09 -0.63 9.35 Brazil Bovespa 85975.47 0.23 12.53 Mexico IPC 48928.78 -0.33 -0.86 Chile IPSA 5688.96 -0.03 2.23 Chile IGPA 28415.08 0.02 1.55 Argentina MerVal 31482.23 -0.16 4.71 Colombia IGBC 12391.20 0.48 8.98 Venezuela IBC 24109.35 6.91 1808.68 Currencies daily % YTD % change change Latest Brazil real 3.3962 -0.49 -2.44 Mexico peso 18.2310 -0.83 8.05 Chile peso 594.3 -0.08 3.42 Colombia peso 2715.49 -0.17 9.81 Peru sol 3.219 -0.06 0.56 Argentina peso 20.1200 0.07 -7.55 (interbank) Argentina peso 20.58 0.15 -6.56 (parallel) (Reporting by Gram Slattery and Claudia Volante; editing by Jonathan Oatis)

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