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This paper evaluates the impact of economic regulation on infrastructure sector outcomes. It tests the impact of regulation from three different angles: aligning costs with tariffs and firm profitability; reducing opportunistic renegotiation; and measuring the effects on productivity, quality of service, coverage, and prices. The analysis uses an extensive data set of about 1,000 infrastructure concessions granted in Latin America from the late 1980s to the early 2000s. The analysis finds that as the theory indicates, regulation matters. The empirical work here reported shows that in three relevant economic aspects-aligning costs and tariffs; dissuading renegotiations; and improving productivity, quality of service, coverage, and tariffs-the structure, institutions, and procedures of regulation matter. Thus, significant efforts should continue to be made to improve the structure, quality, and institutionality of regulation. Regulation matters for protecting both consumers and investors, for aligning closely financial returns and the costs of capital, and for capturing higher levels of benefits from the provision of infrastructure services by the private sector.

Debt Markets --- Developing economies --- Emerging Markets --- Finance and Financial Sector Development --- Financial returns --- Gross domestic product --- Infrastructure Economics --- Infrastructure Economics and Finance --- Infrastructure projects --- Infrastructure Regulation --- Private infrastructure --- Private investment --- Private investments --- Private Participation in Infrastructure --- Private Sector Development --- Privatization --- Regulatory frameworks --- Sustainable Development

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This paper focuses on an evaluation and benchmarking of the governance of regulatory agencies in the electricity sector in Latin American Countries (LAC). Using a unique database, we develop an index of regulatory governance and rank all the agencies in the LAC countries. The index is an aggregate number of the evaluation of four key governance characteristics: autonomy, transparency, accountability, and regulatory tools, including not only formal aspects of regulation but also indicators related to actual implementation. Based on 18 different indexes, we analyze the positions of agencies with regard to different aspects of their regulatory governance, considering not only performance in each variable but also scores in the different components of each category. This evaluation allows for the identification of particular country shortcomings regarding governance, and indicates needed improvements. Although the region shows an overall good governance design of their regulatory agencies, the implementation of the independent regulator model still faces several challenges. This is particularly evident in political autonomy and in the informal aspects of governance, where the region shows the largest number of countries with the lowest scores. Trinidad and Tobago and Brazil show the best results and Ecuador, Honduras, and Chile the poorest performances. The rest of the countries vary according to the different indexes. We give each governance variable equal weights and positively test the robustness of our approach using Principal Component Analysis.

Accountability --- Banks and Banking Reform --- Country Strategy and Performance --- Disclosure --- Good Governance --- Governance --- Governance Indicators --- Institutional Arrangements --- Institutional Development --- Judiciary --- Macroeconomics and Economic Growth --- National Governance --- Public Sector Corruption and Anticorruption Measures --- Regulatory Policies --- Regulatory Policy --- Transparency