In a world immensely exposed to Mexico’s debt and peso.
By Don Quijones, Spain & Mexico, editor at WOLF STREET.
Mexico’s economy has excelled at two key things over the past two decades: opening itself to global capital and attracting foreign direct investment, in particular from American businesses. But those two things could soon become its Achilles heel, especially with Donald Trump seemingly determined to renegotiate, if not scrap altogether, the document most responsible for transforming Mexico into an industrial powerhouse and one of the world’s most open economies, the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA).
Thanks to NAFTA, Mexico has never been so dependent on its northern neighbor. The U.S. accounts for 80% of its exports, 49% of its imports and 60% of all its foreign direct investment. In fact, so intertwined is Mexico’s economy with its northern neighbor that it just became the second biggest exporter to the U.S., overtaking Canada for the first time ever, reports Bloomberg:
Shipments from Mexico totaled $245 billion in the first 10 months of the year, according to Commerce Department figures released Tuesday, ahead of Canada’s $230 billion. If the trend continues, it would be the first time ever the U.S. bought more imports from its neighbor to the south. The two countries ended 2015 tied in exports to the U.S.
The trend of catching up to Canada puts China and Mexico as the top two exporters to the U.S. just as Trump prepares to take office in January, reflecting the strong pull of lower cost jurisdictions for the U.S. economy.
When it comes to low-cost production, few countries can hold a candle to Mexico, whose sub-$4-a-day minimum wage is one of the lowest in Latin America. The country is also the region’s most investment friendly economy, according to the global benchmark of investment standards, the World Bank’s Doing Business report.
But that hasn’t stopped foreign investors from putting their expansion plans on hold since the election. One of Trump’s most popular campaign promises is that he would make it much more costly for U.S. industry to outsource to countries like Mexico and China. The president elect has already brokered a “deal” with United Technologies Corp’s Carrier unit, whereby Indiana taxpayers pay $7 million to Carrier, which will still send hundreds of jobs to Mexico, but 850 fewer jobs for now than before this “deal.”
“If he puts an import duty on Mexican goods, it’s going to be a total disaster,” said Maurizio Rosa, CEO of Codan Rubber Mexico, a maker of hoses for the auto industry with annual sales of some 200 million pesos ($10 million).
The Trump effect has already taken a toll on Mexico’s funding capacity, following Fitch’s recent decision to downgrade the country’s economic outlook from stable to negative. The US rating agency cited a number of reasons, including Mexico’s slowing economy, rapidly expanding public debt and the trials and tribulations of its shrinking energy giant Pemex. But the two most important factors, it said, were price volatility (i.e. inflation) and widespread uncertainty about how a future Trump administration would approach US relations with Mexico.
It’s not just Mexican investors that should be concerned. As Bloomberg reports, the world has never been as invested in Mexico as it is today. Foreign investors hold around $100 billion of Mexico’s local-currency government debt, the most for any emerging market economy. That’s almost 20 times what it was 20 years ago. To further compound matters, the Mexican peso is among the world’s most widely held currencies and is commonly used as a proxy to hedge risk in less liquid markets.
But now the world has become so exposed to Mexico that any rapid sell-off of the country’s assets could have very ugly repercussions far beyond its immediate borders. “A broad stability of the peso is a global public good,” said Alberto Ramos, the chief Latin America economist for Goldman Sachs Group Inc. in New York. “It has repercussions and implications across the financial system and even areas of the financial system that are not directly related to Mexico.”
But it may already be too late: foreign money began to pour out of the country months ago, according to Mexican daily La Jornada, citing data recently published by the Bank of Mexico (often endearingly referred to as Banxico). A total of 132 billion pesos ($6.47 billion) worth of Mexican bonds were unloaded by foreign investors during the first eleven months of 2016. This gathering exodus of foreign investors is one of the major causes of Mexico’s crumbling currency.
As the peso weakens, fears continue to rise over the prospect of one of Mexico’s traditional bugbears — galloping inflation — rearing its ugly head. The five-year breakeven rate, a bond market measure for cost-of-living expectations, has jumped to 4% from 3.2% before the U.S. election. As Bloomberg reports, November’s reading was the highest in almost two years, and Citigroup Inc. expects prices to increase 4.8% next year, the most since 2008.
In an effort to tame price rises Banxico is expected to raise Mexico’s benchmark rate by as much as half a percentage point next week, to 5.75%. It would be its third rate hike this year.
But as was the case with the previous rate hikes, it will be events beyond Mexico’s borders, in particular in Washington and New York, that will ultimately dictate the future movement of Mexico’s currency. If the Federal Reserve decides to raise rates, not only will the peso continue to slide against the dollar, but foreign investors are much more likely to be lured north of the border in the pursuit of rising US Treasury yields.
This is precisely what happened in the run up to the Tequila Crisis of 1994-95, which created (with apologies to Ross Perot) a “giant sucking sound” of money out of Mexico that put some of Wall Street’s finest, including Citi and Goldman Sachs, at enough risk to where the IMF and other entities engineered a bondholder bailout. And this time around, too, the collateral damage will almost certainly not be contained to Mexico’s economy. By Don Quijones, Raging Bull-Shit.
The peso crisis could trigger next dollar-debt crisis in Mexico. Read… Financial “Hurricane” Trump Is Approaching Mexico
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The biggest surprise would be if the Fed were to increase by 50, not 25.
Or did QE 4 instead and headfaked all the dollar longs
Absolutely right. That can happen too. But don’t think so, it would be Yellen’s farewell gift to Trump.
if it is really the CIA / the Deep State that is trying to get rid of Trump (and not just the Democrats and their dirty friends in the media), then it would be no surprise if Yellen & co lower rates, start QE4 and crash the stockmarket (if that it still possible, it seems almost invulnerable by now) just to seal the deal.
And of course generate record profits for insiders along the way; the Goldman Rats could even buy back their taxfree cashed G$ shares a few weeks or months from now and ride the wave of fortune again ;-(
Sorry nhz Id love to agree but did you see who Trump is appointing Treasury secretary? Another Goldman squid swamp dwelling bottom feeder
@Frederick:
Agree with your point, the Trump appointments are worrying and smell like even more establishment in Washington (and denial of much of the real issues at stake) instead of draining the swamp.
However, the opposition from the Deep State seems fierce, do you think this is all theater? Of is it just the Democratic party and their media shills who are fighting Trump? With a bit more of this theater in the next weeks Trump could become a lame-duck president (which might be good if it means the government and elite controls get less effective as a result …).
The Mexican Peso has not “lost over 60% of its value against the US dollar since January 2014.” In January 2014 the exchange rate was about 13 pesos to the U.S. dollar, or about 7.7 U.S. cents for each peso. Currently, the exchange rate is about 20.4 pesos to the U.S. dollar, or about 4.9 U.S. cents per peso. So the peso has lost about (7.7-4.9)/7.7, or about 36% since January 2014.
interesting observation … that is hardly different from how much the euro lost against the US$ over the same period (from about 1.39 then to 1.06 now).
Trump is going to have to devalue the dollar one way or another if he ever hopes to be successful in bringing factory jobs back to the USA that is assuming the robots dont make humans irrelevant before that
The emerging trend in the developed world seems to be a rejection of the status quo. At least in Europe and the USA there’s strong evidence of this. Chinese money voting with its feet, too. The capital flows have been telegraphing this as well. A lot of money has been ,and is , heading towards the mother ship. I don’t think this trend is reversing very soon. Actually, it looks to be gaining momentum.
Good point. Here’s a handy way to keep track.
https://www.bloomberg.com/quote/USDMXN:CUR
Check the 5 year chart. It hit 12 in 2013 and has been upward ever since.
Get that wall built pronto
You mean that US employer engineered ‘permeable membrane’ of a wall, to continue allowing illegal entry into the States, so as to profit Big Bidness (especially Agra-bidness .. but including others as well)…. THAT wall ????
A mine field would be much more effective…. ;)
Yeah, but who is gonna clean up the mess?
Mexico, China, Canada and Japan are now experiencing first-hand the ultimate problem that every other nation on earth must at some point face — how to “go it alone” WITHOUT exporting or importing anything of vital necessity. Chinese and Japanese authorities are struggling with an economic / political solution to this fundamental and, I would say, unsolvable problem as I type. China’s relatively recent experience with two vastly different ways of “harnessing human motivation” (the latest through its “banking system”) will serve them well in this endeavor.
Simply stated, ALL of the individual national economies of the world can and must not depend upon exporting or importing stuff — whether that stuff is TVs, weapon systems, terrestrial resources or food. This proposition is easier to understand if one thinks of the entire world as only ONE nation with only ONE SINGLE economy. Looking at the world this way, to just exactly WHOM would this true macro-economy “export” — the people / economy of Mars? Just as this imaginary one-economy world would certainly have to figure out how to “go it alone”, again, so should all of the real individual nations / economies of the world right now.
One might argue that a “fully globalized” world of individual nations importing from, or exporting to, each other would, in the end, be better prepared to go it alone “as a whole”. But all we have to do is look around at the real world of today to see how well that is going and the likely-horrible next steps in the present process.
In short, exporting and importing are both potentially dangerous to an economy, and, therefore, individual nations should import or export stuff only AFTER they have been going it alone for some period of time.
We see how the Japanese, with their shrinking population, are struggling within an economic system that REQUIRES a growing population and likewise growing export markets. In such a situation, the Japanese must still rely on exporting more and more stuff, but their economic system MUST change in order for the Japanese people to survive over the long term. The absolutely necessary financial / monetary acrobatics of Abenomics within its present, fatally-flawed system, will only serve to DELAY Japan facing reality.
“One might argue that a “fully globalized” world of individual nations importing from, or exporting to, each other would, in the end, be better prepared to go it alone “as a whole”.”
This doesn’t apply to just nations, but also on a much smaller scale like regions, cities and citizens.
Self-sufficiency is not always an option, but relying for important stuff on suppliers from the other side of the globe is crazy if there are alternatives. It makes an economy vulnerable as well. Finance, energy, food … they are all facets of the same issue and IMHO most of these can and should be solved as much as possible on a local scale.
Problem is: our rulers don’t want self-sufficiency and a de-centralized economy. My own government just launched a new initiative for energy production in the next decades, switching from current reliance on fossil energy (mostly natural gas) to ‘sustainable energy’. But instead of switching to e.g. more energy conservation, passive energy technology, solar roofs, locally produced biofuels and all kinds of other small-scale energy production they plan to build the largest wind parks in the world (much bigger even than the several thousand-MWatt parks that are already under construction) and district heating using industrial waste heat. Plus probably some huge nuclear or coal power plants for when there is insufficient wind ;-(
Of course: this way they keep in control and can fix prices (high for consumers, low for their friends in industry) and skim their own profit, just like they do now. I’m fully expecting huge taxes on private solar roofs and electrical cars in the near future, or maybe a mandatory (very expensive) connection to the electric grid even if you don’t need it – just like nowadays outrageous costs are enforced for being connected to electricity, sewer, natural gas etc. networks even if your home is fully self-sufficient :-(
A few points: Canada will always import a lot of produce- from citrus to rice to coffee etc.etc.
‘Japan’s shrinking population’ – it had better shrink if it’s going to feed itself. In fact Japan would be better off to import much more of its rice- which the last time I looked sold in Japan for three times the world price.
The Japanese worker taking the train into Tokyo, looks out at many rice fields. creating a land shortage which prevents him having a larger apartment closer to work.
There are more appropriate places to grow rice than Japan, although our host might disagree.
Both the US and Canada had to work for years to get their apples into Japan- the first ones either had ever wrapped individually.
Re: trade in general. The first big step out the Stone Age was the Bronze Age. The pyramids precede it and the only metal tools used were copper, requiring a constant re-supply as they dulled or bent.
Bronze a much harder metal is created by adding a small amount of tin to copper.
But tin and copper are rarely found near each other- so one of the world’s first trade routes, hundreds of miles, was in tin.
Imagine that every human being outside of Canadian borders ceases to exist. Also assume that the present system in which the vast majority of wealth and large-scale capital equipment is owned by a microscopic percentage of population. Also assume that both “labor” and “management” can organize, as they supposedly can in our present “democracy”, but now the owners of capital can no longer move their capital equipment to other nations where there are desperately poor people who are “willing” to work for food, water and a place on the floor to sleep.
How are Canadians going to “go it alone” when, supposedly, Canada’s economy desperately needs 300,000 immigrants (of a certain “economic” type) every year from now to eternity?
Who’s going to buy all of the natural resources, oil, etc. that Canada can no longer export and, therefore, no longer needs to produce?
To have available the relatively small amount of warm-weather items that only Canada now imports, Canadians can venture forth to those places and produce and send those products “back home”. Naturally, those workers will be paid an amount that also applies to the rest of the Canadian “labor market” and, of course, the Canadian regulatory framework will also apply to those workers and facilities and places of production, as well as Canada’s social benefits.
All of the work that is now done in Canada by “temporary foreign workers” (TFW) and other temporary workers who harvest crops, put roofs on houses, cook food in restaurants, take care of the elderly in nursing homes, etc. will have to be done by Canadians and paid for by Canadians.
Automobiles, trucks, etc. will have to be produced by Canadians for Canadians.
Any thing and any service that Canadians want will have to be produced by Canadians and, naturally, other Canadians will have to pay them to do that, with the workers making enough “profit” to “save” enough money to be able to “retire” when they become physically decrepit.
How much is the above arrangement going to cost Canadians?
When I recently asked my brother in law why Canada finds it necessary to import vehicles, TVs, etc. from other countries, his reply was that if they were produced by Canadians in Canada, “they would be too expensive”. (This coming from a man who hired a TFW to give additional care to his elderly mother who was ALREADY living in a nursing home).
So, could Canadians afford what they need and want by “going it alone” under the present economic system in which the vast majority of wealth and large-scale capital equipment is owned/controlled by a microscopic percentage of population for their own benefit?
No, they can’t afford it under the present economic system. And this is why under the present economic system essentially desperate slave labor is needed to provide what Canadians need. This is why “trade agreements” such as NAFTA between international corporations are needed to exploit the most desperate.
What is needed by Canada is an economic system in which the populace owns/controls large capital equipment collectively, and collectively provides the LABOR to run it, as well as provide all Canadians with what they need to enjoy a good life from birth to death.
Part of the problem is who determines what they “need” – citizens are continually brainwashed into thinking they need (or worse, “are entitled to”) lots of stuff that needs to be imported from other countries and on which a small elite often makes outrageous profits, and which also means much bigger control from banksters over the economy.
Why do so many citizens worldwide aspire to use the same new iPhones every year, watch American soap series and movies, consume their daily portion of junk food, buy big and fast cars that are stuck in traffic with one passenger for most of the trip to work? It would be much wiser if they adapt a bit more to what their local economy can offer, like it was before globalisation – but such local preferences and capabilities are now discredited by the media.
I’m not against global trade, but IMHO essential products like healthy food, energy, news/information etc. should be locally produced when possible (which includes “if not extremely expensive”). If government stops messing with the market through tariffs, subsidies etc. and people have to pay for every imported product what it really costs (including the damage it causes etc.) maybe they would think a bit differently about what they ‘need’.
This is another reason why centralised government and globalisation (NWO, EU elites) etc. are a really bad idea; you cannot force the same ideas on people that live in very different conditions. Many things can and should be decided at the local level.
I have a differing opinion on that. How well would developed countries be doing right now if they didn’t have access to the developments in Silicon Valley. I think they wouldn’t even have computers for another 100 years.
The problem with globalization is not the trade between countries – it’s that our crony system allows the benefit of free trade to flow entirely to the top .1% of the population, just because they have connections, wealth, and political influence. Fix that problem and globalization would be a good thing.
probably Sili-con Valley would not have any computers in that case anyway; the computer is not strictly a US invention, and the production mostly depends on cheap slave labor abroad …
“One might argue that a “fully globalized” world of individual nations importing from, or exporting to, each other would, in the end, be better prepared to go it alone “as a whole”. But all we have to do is look around at the real world of today to see how well that is going and the likely-horrible next steps in the present process.”
Now if there was 1 set of rules then there would be no problem.
As long as you have china and its Globalized Vampire Corporate allies gaming the system, with different sets of rules, it can only ever work for them.
P45 is not somebody I support however he is correct the playing field needs to be leveled.
“We see how the Japanese, with their shrinking population, are struggling within an economic system that REQUIRES a growing population and likewise growing export markets. In such a situation, the Japanese must still rely on exporting more and more stuff, but their economic system MUST change in order for the Japanese people to survive over the long term. The absolutely necessary financial / monetary acrobatics of Abenomics within its present, fatally-flawed system, will only serve to DELAY Japan facing reality.”
NO.
Japan is trying to change its economic model, also japan is dealing with an age overhang and the financial experiments of the 80/90’s once these issues resolves, it will be strong and happy with as continually shrinking population and robots.
Japan like china understands there are to many people in their country and to many people on the planet.
They are just dealing with it a different way.
Part of the Japanese problem is that some company’s refuse to accept a model, that does not include, an ever increasing population, and ever increasing credit.
This is not just a Japanese problem, it is a global one.
(Now I know how that Happened last time.)
“the computer is not strictly a US invention,”
The Computer is not a US invention full stop. It is a British Jewish one, Just like Nuclear weapons. Many of the Jews being refugees from Germany.
The first working computer was a valve one.
It was used to do all the calculations for the British nuclear weapons, in England before America had even heard of nuclear weapons, and was still hiding in its isolationism..
Te problem with globalization is that it allows for improving the world welfare as a whole, while government-appointing elections are made by citizens locally.
The game has been going on for decades: globalization has allowed workers in rich countries to benefit from lower prices for base imported products in exchange for not improving their real wages.
Problem is that to accept this exchange workers must keep their jobs and wages. However, globalization has fostered outsourcing factories and jobs overseas, so a higher number of electing citizens are no longer happy with this exchange as they have lost their jobs or ar afraid of losing them.
Of course, those making money from globalizating manufacturing, funding, etc are very happy with globalization, but you can not expect massive numbers of low-skilled or mid-skilled workers play this game as they can not “outsource tehmseleves overseas” or re-train themselves.
This intrinsical problem (global benefits but local elections) is a problem arising precisely in rich countries. Either you hold global elections in which citizens in poor countries have a say in electing governments or the exchange ultimately leads to local-electing citizens overhauling globalization
Last time e it ended up in the wrong place.
“One might argue that a “fully globalized” world of individual nations importing from, or exporting to, each other would, in the end, be better prepared to go it alone “as a whole”. But all we have to do is look around at the real world of today to see how well that is going and the likely-horrible next steps in the present process.”
Now if there was 1 set of rules then there would be no problem.
As long as you have china and its Globalized Vampire Corporate allies gaming the system, with different sets of rules, it can only ever work for them.
P45 is not somebody I support however he is correct the playing field needs to be leveled.
“We see how the Japanese, with their shrinking population, are struggling within an economic system that REQUIRES a growing population and likewise growing export markets. In such a situation, the Japanese must still rely on exporting more and more stuff, but their economic system MUST change in order for the Japanese people to survive over the long term. The absolutely necessary financial / monetary acrobatics of Abenomics within its present, fatally-flawed system, will only serve to DELAY Japan facing reality.”
NO.
Japan is trying to change its economic model, also japan is dealing with an age overhang and the financial experiments of the 80/90’s once these issues resolves, it will be strong and happy with as continually shrinking population and robots.
Japan like china understands there are to many people in their country and to many people on the planet.
They are just dealing with it a different way.
Part of the Japanese problem is that some company’s refuse to accept a model, that does not include, an ever increasing population, and ever increasing credit.
This is not just a Japanese problem, it is a global one.
‘Foreign investors hold a hundred billion of Mexico’s local currency debt’
Wow that surprises me. I guess they’re getting a heck of a juicy interest rate. Or were because it wouldn’t cover the losses this year.
I would have assumed, incorrectly, that any foreign loan to Mexico would be dollar denominated.
I wonder how many new peso loans we’ll see in the future.
I’m still puzzled how we can see Mexican produce up here in Canada ( tomatoes etc. ) plus quite a few manufactures, e.g. plumbing fixtures, , the place has low labor costs and still seems to be having problems.
Its like pulling the handle on a slot machine- three cherries line up- but there’s no pay off.
It is not great news for Canada that Mexico has caught up in exports to US, they are nibbling away at our auto parts and auto production.
But if we’re going to have the consolation of being able to have a cheap SAFE holiday down there, we need the money we’ve lost to trickle down.
PS: ‘legalization’ of pot growing in several US states has dealt a blow to Mexico’s growers. So if the Trump admin harkens to Pence and other bible thumpers and enforces federal law, that would help Mexico.
I don’t think that will happen, the states would just tell the DEA to get lost. (Towards the end of Prohibition, NY State passed a law that no NY police would help enforce it)
This would not be the only area of de facto secession. I expect California, with some of the world’s toughest pollution laws, to sever its connection with the EPA,.
I’ve heard heroin is the thing now coming across the border, not pot. I wonder if theres a “substitution” catagory for buyers going from pot to smack in the inflation calculators? Wait long enough and we’ll be the ones going over the wall.
I was serving jury duty last year and while standing around waiting for court to begin, a couple of the bailiffs were having conversation about their full time jobs at the prison and how it’s a rough place it didn’t used to be as dangerous of a job decades past. When they mentioned heroin and the ongoing epidemic I couldn’t resist but to stop them to ask where all this heroin was coming from?
One of them looked me in the eye and told me it’s easy to make locally, I could manufacture it in my garage if I had the desire.
So it’s quite clear as citizens, we’re not being educated/informed by public officials as to what’s really going on. To me that means we’re being mislead.
“I’ve heard heroin is the thing now coming across the border, not pot.”
Again.
There is a cycle, as consumer demand changes, or is changed, by interference.
Cocaine replaced Heroine as the “Cool” drug in Hollywood. Now Heroin is again “Cool” in Hollywood.
Whats “Cool ” in Movie land, becomes “Cool” in America, every time.
The addiction starts with a prescription!
North American Fair Trade Act., in lieu of Free Trade Act? Oh, the HORROR!.. Of course this concept never dawned on previous administrations. Oh my, wonder why?
Sooner or later, the crisis was coming back to haunt and yet status quid pro-quo never wavered. No, not until we’re staring down the barrel of municipal bond collapse and social net cuts does the public finally wake up and vote out the presiding criminal enterprise.
Buy low sell high!