US companies can avoid slow torture of Venezuela devaluations by taking one big hit

The slow torture of operating in Venezuela led PepsiCo to report last week a $105 million charge to remeasure assets at its Venezuelan operations. PepsiCo also prepared investors for more charges, saying it was "watching developments closely" to see if more currency changes are needed. Diaper and tissue maker Kimberly Clark in January said it took a $462 million charge for revaluing Venezuelan assets. And it isn't only American companies that are taking a hit - a similar revaluation on Monday led Spanish telecoms company Telefonica SA to cut the value of its net assets in Venezuela by 2.84 billion euros ($3.23 billion). More…