The general outlook was stormy, with isolated sunny patches. In the event there storm clouds have stayed on the horizon, and the inhabitants of South Beach decided to make the best of it, and optimistically hit the beach as normal. The fact the Festival was taking place was a show of Latin american optimism. 

This optimism is tangible in the Festival audience, even the gloomy outlook in the opening keynote from leading economist Hernando de Soto failed to dampen the mood. Bold statements, like those from Henrique de Castro ("Mobile is going to be the main media. Everyone, everywhere, & always connected.") and Rich DelCore's criticism of the established agency model kept the debate lively and the Twitter feeds active.

Latin American creativity has been a key feature in many of the presentations, and one of the founding principles of the Festival has been to provide a platform to showcase the creative media pedigree of the region. Statistics like the fact that Latin American countries account for half of the top 12 most active social media users in the world belie the fact that brands are still not exploiting the platform to its full potential. For many brands, simply existing on Facebook is where the social strategy begins and ends while other brands waste time and money attempting to find a presence on every platform available.

Day one of the conference was dominated by names from the agency, media owner and tech space, with brands taking more of the spotlight from day two. Beyond de Soto's opening keynote, the global financial picture hasn't really been mentioned in today's discussions. It will be interesting to see if brands, as the purse holders of the industry, mirror the optimism from today.