PRICESMART TO INVEST US$90 MILLION IN CENTRAL AMERICA.

U.S. retailer PriceSmart Inc. (PSMT.O) said it would invest US$90 million to build six new stores in Central America and the Caribbean. PriceSmart will open stores in the Dominican Republic, Guatemala, Aruba and St. Thomas during the company's coming fiscal year, which begins September 1, said Vice President for Business Development Richard Kiy. "Business in Central America and the Caribbean is going very well. It's a market which other chains from the U.S. haven't found yet," Kiy said. PriceSmart, which already has 16 of its membership shopping warehouses in the region, opened its first area store in Panama in 1996. It has some 600,000 customers in the region. (See related story in Barbados section.)