While the US is the biggest power in the negotiations, completing an FTAA deal depends a great deal on Brazil, the largest Latin American economy. Brazil has a lot to lose in the negotiations and has been lukewarm to the FTAA, instead favouring Mercosur as an alternative. Trade tensions between Brazil and Canada include ongoing skirmishes of jet aircraft subsidies, and more recently, accusations over mad cow disease in Brazilian cattle. Brazil has also had major disagreements with the US over intellectual property. Other factors could affect the FTAA negotiations as well.
Political instability is also a factor in Bolivia, Peru and Ecuador.
And Venezuela, under President Hugo Chavez, has been a thorn in the US side. Finally, trade tensions between Canada and the US could heat up, with the end of the Softwood Lumber Agreement, and threats from the US to impose punitive duties on Canadian lumber exports. The US would like an agreement that makes it the hub economy to everyone else's spokes. The US also views the FTAA negotiations as part of a broader strategic context with regard to influencing negotiations in other arenas that involve big players such as the EU and Japan. In this way, bilateral, regional and global trade initiatives reinforce one another.