Carlos Slim Helu plans to invest nearly US$4 billion next year to grow Telmex (NYSE: TMX), his Mexican fixed-line telephony business, and America Movil (NASDAQ: AMOV), his Latin American mobile phone business, according to a Reuters report.

He will invest approximately US$950 million in Telmex, with possible additional investment if the Mexican government authorizes Telmex to operate so-called triple play services — cable, Internet, and phone services using a single broadband connection.  (How is that for a carrot to Mexican government officials charged with granting Slim triple-play authority?)

He will invest approximately US$3 billion in America Movil to expand its cell phone network in Latin America.

Whoops-a-daisy!  The U.S. government made a “mistake” buying troubled assets from banks, said Carlos Slim Helu, the world’s second richest man, at a conference on stock markets in Mexico City, as reported by Bloomberg.  Slim said that the assets are hard to manage.

He added that the recent global financial crisis began in the U.S., where “there was bad regulation and worse supervision” of derivatives instruments.

As we previously reported, in lieu of a government-sponsored automotive industry bailout, Slim has suggested that struggling U.S. automakers file for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection and renegotiate uncompetitive labor union contracts in exchange for giving workers company shares.

If Slim is correct regarding U.S. government purchases of troubled bank assets and the auto industry bailout, which congress appears poised to enact tomorrow, the U.S. government may have racked up two whoops-a-daisies for taxpayers in the early stages of the financial crisis, a high score considering that each whoops-a-daisy is worth a few billion dollars.