Yesterday a Mexican journalist posted a good question, what would be the impact of Mexico leaving the USMCA free trade agreement?
My conclusions: The answer for Mexico is unknowable, but we should expect a negative trend. The two largest energy players (CFE & Pemex) are operating in crisis mode with excessive borrowings and little or no profits, as they are both used by the government for social engineering. The Mexican government has neither the will nor the resources to combat the Americans (Canada is inconsequential here). Three things are certain: (a) new investments are unlikely to come to Mexico as the government detests foreign capital (b) CAPEX by foreign companies is unlikely to rise, and finally, and (c) a lot of US companies are "on-shoring" jobs to meet the challenges of weak supply chains.
Reasoning
Mexico is the US third largest trading partner with a merchandise trade deficit of about $100 billion per annum (pre-pandemic). The big difference is in services where Mexico is a massive remittance recipient and also an important tourist destination for Americans...and many others. Trade with Canada is inconsequential with about $14 billion of TOTAL trade between the two nations. Again, Canada has a $10 billion trade deficit with Mexico -- mostly smaller automobiles that are manufactured in Mexico.
So let's look at specific impacts between Mexico and USA/Canada
1) Automobile market:
Most smaller vehicles are manufactured in Mexico since building them in the US or Canada would be unprofitable. However, the current aggressive shift towards electric vehicles will require massive investments into vehicle production lines. It may be more attractive for American car manufacturers to repatriate the building of vehicles to the US, especially since electric vehicles are much simpler to assemble and require less manpower than their ICE equivalent. This segment would likely be massively affected over the next decade (which means never for politicians), However, the UK with Brexit saw vehicle manufacturing (for the continent) drop by more than 60% over the past five years, with the loss of thousands of high paying jobs.
2) Aerospace and high-end manufacturing
This segment will not be affected since the margins are substantial and there have been massive orders from Mexicans, also relocating aerospace sub-assembly is complex and costly. However, very little of the value of these sectors creates economic value added in Mexico because of the high cost of capital
3) Mining & others
Mexico has the world's 7th largest deposit of Lithium but it ranks 34th (out of 37) in quality as its deposits, concentration is very low, therefore the battery aspect with massive Lithium deposit is not a card it can play. In addition, the Mexican government has made the extraction of Lithium by non-government groups illegal. Finally, Mexico's reputation in dealing with foreign companies in the mining sector has been poor with expropriation once the projects are ready to move to production. Foreign mining concerns have generally steered clear of Mexico
4) Maquiladoras
As a cheap labour producer of goods Mexico has certain attractive features. However, over the past three years, security has become an increasing headache for foreign companies operating in the country (especially in the North). This low-value manufacturing can easily be moved to other locations should it be required, but any tariffs would have to be massive. An interesting space to watch but probably safe for now.
4) Food
Here Mexico has an important card to play since any tariffs would reflect on the prices to consumers (as it would in all cases above).
5) Water, Energy & other
Mexico's weakest point. The country is very dependent on natural gas, of which 70% is imported from the USA. Pemex has not had the resources to extract natural gas from its oil production and has generally burned the gas as waste. Mexico is very dependent on the US for its gasoline (70%). Mexico is also dependent on the US for water (again in the north). The US has been aggressively dealing with water management issues in the face of a serious drought, while Mexico has done virtually nothing (the first step was to close beer plants in the region about two weeks ago).
Mexico's financial position
Mexico's problem is a lack of resources, the three massive projects undertaken by the Mexican government (Maya train, refinery and DFE airports) have drained the treasury of any resources. By some well-informed, estimates the total expenditure on these projects has already exceeded US$ 55 billion or about 136% of the Mexican government's annual REVENUES, and the current administration already operates at a small deficit for its ordinary activities. Excluding borrowings from CFE and Pemex.
Geopolitical Issues
Again, this is all about the US, and their worries about Mexican and Latin American immigration flows; Mexico could stop cooperating and allow Latin American migrants to travel to the US border. There they would let the Americans deal with the problem. In addition, since the Rio Grande is almost dry so illegal crossings could rise further.
Taking Brexit as an example, the cost of the retreat of the UK from the European Union has been massive, but a lot of the losses have been, so far, hidden by the COVID pandemic. In the UK, in 2022 vehicle production is down 22% from the previous year for the first six months of the year, and GDP growth was 0.7% when 8.7% was predicted.
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