Fecha Publicación: 08-04-2025

Daniel Batlle:

Okay. Antonio, where does the announcement on tariffs from Wednesday leave Mexico? What is your outlook for the Mexican economy? When you look at the announcement Wednesday, and the tariffs that were announced in March?

Antonio Ortiz-Mena:

Okay, how long do we have? Let me take the same tack that Luis took. Let me take a step back to give you a context of what I believe happened, and then make reference to the specifics about Mexico-US economic relations, and USMGA and the prospects.

So, what happened on April 2nd, and I do think that everybody will remember that date, April 2nd, 2025 was the biggest change in global trade policy since at least 1930. In 1930, the US House and Senate passed the Smoot-Hawley Act, which raised tariffs with the aim of protecting farmers and industrial workers. What happened back then is that those tariffs resulted in other countries retaliating and US farm workers and industrial workers being worse off than before the tariffs. And in fact, four years later, the US Congress passed something called the Reciprocal Trade Agreements Act, which started to backtrack on the imposition of those tariffs, and that in turn led to the system that the victorious allies created after World War II, which is the GATT and the WTO.

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