Monday, June 8, 2009

If you thought Q1 GDP was bad...

The drop in Mexico's headline GDP in the second quarter will exceed the first quarter's 8.2% plunge. The triple whammy -- recession, an adverse Semana Santa effect, and the flu -- ensure that the year over year drop (the way the headline figure is reported) will be greater in the quarter ending this month than in the first three months of the year. We could easily be looking at a 9% drop.
Measured against the previous quarter, however, we might see that the economy has bottomed out. In the third quarter, we'll see both a smaller year over year rate of contraction and an advance against the second quarter.