The superpeso’s next act
Mexico’s currency has had an improbably good run. The peso appreciated 15% against the dollar last year, and has continued its run thus far in 2026, printing another 4.5% gain. Yet beneath the superpeso’s gleaming surface, the economy it represents looks decidedly less impressive. Growth has been feeble. GDP expanded just 0.6% in 2025, and the economy contracted outright in the first quarter of this year. American tariffs—first levied under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, then replaced with duties under Section 122 of the Trade Act—have cast a long shadow over manufacturing, particularly the automotive sector that forms the...