I usually start with the political situation in the United States, but today I will start with Mexico.
As the 2024 elections approach and in the face of the gloom felt by a part of the electorate due to the almost second victory of Morena, the Gálvez phenomenon arises and has awakened passions and controversies among voters.
A woman of humble origin who entered the government 20 years ago today seems to be the most viable candidate of the Frente Amplio to compete in 2024 against the candidate nominated by the governing party.
Any politician who enters the system has calluses to tread on. Still, obviously, Xóchitl feels like an agent of change and a ray of hope for the minority of Mexicans who are not happy with AMLO’s government and do not see any of the possible candidates who will change the current situation.
Morena’s political and electoral machinery is mighty and well supported by the number of states where the party has governors. In addition, it has much more economic resources for the campaign. The fact that AMLO’s popularity is still above 60% speaks for itself, of how the neediest class was ignored for almost 30 years, who still believe that Morena represents their possible way out of poverty. It will be tough to change them, even if the opposition candidate originally comes from the low-income sector.
The elections are still a long way off, there will be tours, debates, and many analyses that could change the current situation, but today I feel that the race will favor the “official candidate”.
One possibility for Xóchitl would be that Morena will select Ebrard, who I do not believe since he is not aligned with AMLO, decides to run as a representative of Movimiento Ciudadano and that he manages to take enough votes away from Morena to turn the race into an actual 3-way contest. In this situation, Xóchitl could sneak in as Allende did in Chile in 1970, where he was elected president with only 36.61% of the vote.
Returning to the United States, the political situation is very complicated, as a rematch between Trump and Biden is taking shape even though both have serious problems.
President Biden continues with his physical and cognitive problems with several falls in public events, disorientation in how he enters and leaves meetings, confusion of names and dates, and mistaking the cities or countries he refers to. He is also burdened by severe legal problems affecting his son Hunter, who is accused of corruption, tax evasion, and other crimes, and in some cases, appear to include the president himself.
Trump has a big lead in the polls among Republicans despite being accused of taking official documents without permission, lying to the Justice Department, and sexual harassment issues. Still, it all seems to be slipping away from him and not affecting his chances of becoming president again.
It is a shame, as we have already expressed through this medium, that in a country as developed as the United States, with 335 million inhabitants, there could not be two better candidates for the most critical position in the world.
Economic sentiment has quickly shifted from a moderate recession to what they call a soft landing, as inflation has dropped from 9% to 3% per year by the most popular measure, or to 4.8% if you remove food and energy from the calculation, and only discuss the less volatile products and services.
I believe that we are not yet entirely out of the crisis and that there will be a few months in early 2024 when jobs will be lost, the best definition of recession, in my opinion.
Biden’s programs, such as Inflation Reduction, Infrastructure development, and incentives for semiconductor manufacturing in the United States, have served to sustain the economy with very moderate but positive growth. However, they will have a powerful impact on the budget deficit and the development of the government debt, which already exceeds 33 Trillion dollars.
Unemployment is still at deficient levels (3.7%), unemployment insurance applications are growing slightly, and the creation of new high-paying jobs is down. Still, overall there is no sense of a recessionary environment. Home sales have been up and down due to unmet demand, little new home construction, and the impact of mortgage rates that have more than doubled in the last year. On the other hand, rents have stopped rising steeply and, in some cities, have dropped as much as 12%.
Foreign investment in the United States fell to 282 billion dollars in the first half of the year from 385 billion dollars a year earlier due to the economic contraction in the rest of the world and the uncertainty as to whether or not there will be a recession in the United States.
The review of the U.S. banking system was completed, and of the 26 large banks analyzed, all passed the test of soundness and capacity to face a possible economic crisis. Despite this, the Central Bank is about to pass a new provision where banks will require more equity capital, reducing their capacity to grant loans and reducing the economy’s growth.
Another vital change proposed is instant cash, which means anyone who deposits a check will have it available immediately, taking away the banks’ ability to use the funds for a few days while concluding operations.
The Supreme Court’s decision that those with student debt should pay it and not cancel it as Biden wanted will be another headwind for the economy since the payment to the bank avoids having that money available for other types of consumption. The amount of that debt was almost 400 billion dollars.
It is estimated that the savings accumulated during the pandemic from government subsidies, which amounted to $2.7Trillion have already been significantly reduced and that those of the lower and lower middle class will be gone by September 2023, bringing the exaggerated consumption of this sector of the population back to pre-Covid normalcy.
On the other hand, consumer confidence is on the rise, with the number of cars sold in the first half of the year up 12% compared to the previous year. The increase in wages and salaries averages 4.4% annually, although the trend is downward, mainly due to substituting higher-paying jobs for lower-paying jobs.
Interestingly, 49% of homes have mortgages of 50% or less of their value, compared to 31% just five years ago. This is a consequence of home price inflation without a proportional increase in debt.
I think it is worth mentioning what is happening with the explosion of Artificial Intelligence (A.I.) that is impacting many fields such as medicine, engineering, financial planning, etc., and has generated a 4 trillion dollar gain in market value for companies involved in this new technological advancement.
I feel that, well used, it is an enormous advance, but at the same time, it lends itself to losing the human capacity for analysis and creativity. It should be seen as a means, not an end since the transcendental decisions in the different sectors of life should not be left solely in the hands of programmers and machines.
Turning to Mexico, the economy has shown much greater strength than projected, and economic growth for 2023 has already been revised to 3% versus only 1.2% in the United States.
Official inflation is 5.06%, and “core” inflation is 6.89%. Still, it should not be forgotten that these numbers are somewhat influenced by subsidies to several essential food basket products and gasoline, the latter being at the highest level of the year.
The U.S.-Mexico relationship has deteriorated due to differences in immigration policy, the CUSMA/USMCA/T-MEC disputes regarding energy, transportation, and corn, and the problems with the Vulcan concession in Quintana Roo and fentanyl, to the extent that, in a poll of Republican voters, for the first time in more than ten years, the vote reflected more people who see Mexico as an enemy than as a friend.
Mexico is now the number 1 country in trade with the U.S., with $263B in the first four months of the year, although in foreign direct investment, it is far behind Brazil, with $40B vs. $92B in 2022.
Country risk, measured by the difference in what countries’ sovereign bonds pay over U.S. bonds, pushed Mexico from fifth place in Latin America to tenth place, a move in the wrong direction.
Many good things are happening in Mexico, such as exports rose 1.1%, while imports fell 6.1%; both IMEF internally and the International Monetary Fund raised their growth forecasts for 2023 and 2024; the government created a mechanism to facilitate the creation of companies for the famous nearshoring, and the train from CDMX to Toluca will begin to operate.
On the other hand, there continue to be negative signals, such as the average increase in housing rents of 13.6% in the first quarter, the strong negative impact for public companies of inflation and the super peso, and the continued insecurity and death toll throughout the republic.
I do not know in which category to put the creation of Mexicana de Aviación, as I do not see the logic of having an airline owned by the state and managed by the military.
I think it is necessary to mention the policy change regarding PEMEX, where for years, it was said that it would have to defend itself. Suddenly the Treasury injected resources and suggested that it could absorb the debt of the state-owned company. In my opinion, this measure is very wise since it could significantly reduce the financial costs, knowing that Mexico cannot let PEMEX go bankrupt because, being 100% state-owned, it would affect the credit for the sale of the country’s debt.
In closing the analysis of Mexico, I would like to mention some things that I did not think were accurate in the morning news, such as the suggestion to Televisa to “watch what it says”, the continuous mention of Xóchitl, the ignoring of INE and the promotion of Morena and the veiled threat to several journalists.
In Israel, demonstrations against judicial reform continue, especially since the parliament has already approved the first part of the reform.
The reduction in both domestic and foreign investments has been solid, and it is most likely that the country will have a recession in 2024 after a 6.5% growth in 2022 and 2% in 2023 after the expectation of 3.5% before the parliamentary crisis. Investment in tech startups dropped 68% to $3.7B in the first half of 2023, moving the country from fifth to tenth place as the best-funded country in the tech ecosystem.
The Shekel at 3.65 is slightly better than the 3.75 per dollar it touched in June but still below the level of previous years. The central bank decided not to continue raising the discount rate of 4.75% because of political problems and the economic slowdown.
Prime Minister Netanyahu had a health scare requiring a pacemaker, but apparently, he is now well and ready to continue with his Supreme Court reform project.
Some interesting comments on other countries. Russia surpassed Saudi Arabia for the first time in oil production. The situation between Russia and the Wagner group, a mercenary company, is quite critical, as the risk for the government is enormous if they fail to neutralize the rebel company. This was the first severe attack against Putin’s dictatorship; Taiwan saw a 23% drop in exports.
China’s slowdown has been impressive, as it does not seem to react despite the many subsidies and incentives created by the government. Neither the lowering of mortgage rates nor the reduction of prices has significantly reactivated the sale of houses, and the nationalist policy has reduced foreign investment, affecting the provinces with high industrial development.
Europe continues to reject the Belt and Road program, and only the emerging countries have accepted it, and now many of them cannot pay the credits China gave them.
Stock markets continued to rise, with the seven stocks that dominate the S&P trading at 40 times earnings and the other 493 at 19.6 times. Rarely dominates, so few stocks have been seen.
Bonds had a weak month as the treasury note returned to almost 4%, although the emerging market and lower quality bonds were not bad, rising nearly 1%.
The dollar remains weak, and gold returned slightly above $2,000, with bitcoin down almost $2,000 on the month.
Speaking of the super peso, which closed at $16.72 (today $16.88), it bears repeating that such strength seriously affects all four pillars of the economy and only benefits exporters and domestic capital flight. However, it also makes it easier to pay their liabilities to those who owe dollars, the primary debtor being the government and its subsidiaries.
For the good of Mexico, I would like not to leave a pure float but to try to reach $18.50-$19.00 for the good of the country itself.
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