Signals from the North

Published in El Universal
(Mexico) on 17 April 2021
by (link to originallink to original)
Translated from by Tom Walker. Edited by Gillian Palmer.
It was just a matter of time. Less than three months into the administration of Democrat Joe Biden, the U.S. has turned its attention to the economic and energy situation in Mexico.

Through the Treasury Department, the U.S. government presented its semiannual report on the financial policies of its main trading partners. In the report, the Biden administration sees the erratic policy of the Mexican federal government in the energy field as a threat to the recovery and growth of Mexico.

The report laments the fact that our country marginalizes and disparages renewable energy options while giving priority to what are described as “loss-making state-owned enterprises,” namely government entities in the energy production area like Mexican Petroleum or the Federal Electricity Commission. The Mexican government is trying to give these companies favorable treatment in the belief that in so doing, their market power in the energy sector will be assured.

According to the U.S. Treasury Department report, Mexico’s energy policy will affect the consumer in the end, with higher costs for energy service and supply. At the same time, it will benefit their chosen energy-producing companies, sidelining or not taking on other investment projects that would be more beneficial for the country’s development and growth.

Fortunately, in the eyes of the U.S., the Mexican picture is not completely negative. The report highlights as positive the fact that the Mexican flexible exchange rate policy has succeeded in sustaining the stability of the Mexican peso against foreign currencies, despite the turbulence that has been shaking up the foreign exchange market.

That is reassuring to Mexican financial institutions because there is a rumor internationally that Mexico has been manipulating the peso exchange rate in an attempt to gain an advantage in the world market. But this last report emphasizes that it is only being watched closely from the perspective of foreign exchange policy as related to its approach to its trading partners.

However, for the Biden administration, there appears to be a certain amount of inertia with respect to the policies of the Donald Trump administration that preceded it. The current administration is still concerned about the uncertainty arising out of Mexico’s regulatory processes in the energy sector, while at the same time it maintains a hostile climate for investments by foreign companies in Mexico.

All of these signals are concerning and should be taken seriously because they come from Mexico’s principal trading partner, a country to which the future of our country is inextricably linked.


Señalamientos desde el norte

Era cuestión de tiempo. En menos de tres meses de la administración del demócrata Joe Biden, ya se puso el ojo sobre la situación económica y energética de México.

A través de su Departamento del Tesoro, el gobierno estadounidense presentó un informe semestral sobre políticas financieras de sus principales socios comerciales, en el que el gobierno de Biden ve como amenazas para la recuperación y el crecimiento de México la errática política de la administración estatal mexicana en el campo energético.

En el documento se deplora que nuestro país margine y denoste la opción de las energías renovables, mientras se privilegian a lo que calificaron como “empresas estatales deficitarias”, que no son otras que las entidades del Estado en el campo de la producción energética como Petróleos Mexicanos (Pemex) o la Comisión Federal de Electricidad (CFE), a las que el gobierno mexicano busca beneficiar en la creencia de que así se garantizará su dominio en el mercado energético.

A decir del informe del Departamento del Tesoro norteamericano, las políticas energéticas de México terminan afectando al usuario nacional con costos más elevados por el servicio y suministro de energía, a la par que, por beneficiar a sus denominadas empresas productivas, se ponen de lado o no se abordan otros proyectos de inversión que resultarían más beneficiosas para el desarrollo y crecimiento de la nación.

Afortunadamente, no todo el panorama mexicano es negativo a los ojos estadounidenses, ya que el informe destaca como positivo que la política de cambio flexible de México ha logrado sostener la estabilidad del peso mexicano frente a las divisas extranjeras, a pesar de la turbulencia económica que agita al mercado cambiario internacional.

Eso tranquiliza a las entidades financieras mexicanas, ya que se había generado el rumor internacional en el sentido de que México manipulaba el tipo de cambio del peso en un intento de conseguir ventajas comerciales en el mercado mundial, pero en este último informe se hace hincapié en que sólo se le vigila desde el aspecto de política cambiaria por una cuestión de metodología hacia sus socios comerciales.

No obstante, para la administración Biden parece haber una inercia con respecto a su antecesor Trump, pues persisten las preocupaciones sobre la incertidumbre que genera México sobre sus procesos regulatorios en el sector energético, a la vez que se mantienen los señalamientos sobre el clima poco amigable hacia las inversiones de empresas estadounidenses en territorio mexicano.

Todos esos señalamientos deben tomarse con preocupación y seriedad, ya que vienen del que es el principal socio comercial de México, y al cual el futuro de nuestro país está inevitablemente ligado.

This post appeared on the front page as a direct link to the original article with the above link .

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