The Cuban-American National Chamber of Commerce (CANCC) took a significant step on Wednesday towards the establishment of a capital market in Cuba: it gathered between 10 and 15 prominent private entrepreneurs to begin designing what would be the Havana Stock and Commodity Exchange, a stock and commodities exchange based in Havana.
Juan Omar Sixto, president of the chamber, revealed the project in an interview with Tania Costa, where he explained that the meeting on June 24 aimed to "outline and sketch the foundation of what would become the stock exchange. It is called Havana Stock and Commodity Exchange in Havana, Cuba."
The project is not limited to the exchange. Sixto described a complete financial ecosystem: a finance institute to graduate stock brokers, insurance agents, real estate agents, and mortgage brokers, along with an annual World Congress of Multinational Investors aimed at attracting permanent capital to the market.
For the meeting, a prospectus was prepared addressed to 100 multinational companies. The central figure of the gathering is Joseph Fernández, trustee of the CANCC, who will lead the session due to his stock market experience.
Fernández owns a publicly traded company listed under the symbol BWIV, structured as a SPAC — Special Purpose Acquisition Company — with a capitalization of 180 million dollars and shares priced at 10 dollars, aimed at directing investments toward sectors such as tourism and health in Cuba.
"He is ready for when tourism, healthcare, etc., in Cuba need to seek investors; he will bring them," Sixto explained.
The president of the chamber, who worked for three years at Merrill Lynch in New York, bases his proposal on a lesson that, in his view, the Cuban exile community failed to learn: "Cubans in Miami have built wealth in real estate, but the stock market, due to their unfamiliarity with the system in New York, never complemented their real estate investments with stock investments. And to me, that was a mistake because it could have tripled the capital of the exile community."
That experience, he says, should not be repeated when Cuba transitions to a free system. "Cuba must take off like a rocket to the moon or Mars in terms of business from day one," he stated.
Regarding the necessary capital, Sixto did not hold back on figures. “I estimate that it will have to be easily 200, 300, 400 billion because Cuba is completely destroyed. In other words, the capital has to be massive progressively.”
The entire plan is contingent upon a genuine political transition. The CANCC, founded in April 2026 by Cuban-American entrepreneurs predominantly of Pinar del Río origin, demands full legal guarantees for private enterprise before moving a single dollar to the island.
Sixto dismisses the proposals from the Díaz-Canel regime—which include swapping debt for assets and selling shares of state-owned companies—as mere bait without real backing.
This rejection occurs alongside the 176 economic reforms approved by the Cuban National Assembly on June 19, which formally open the door for diaspora investment, but which the organized exile considers insufficient without a structural political change.
Cuba has not had a stock exchange since 1959. The next meeting of the CANCC is scheduled for July 22, 2026, when the chamber will hold its third working session.
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