Grim Economic News from Mexico and Canada
March 18, 2009
NAFTA ties Canada and Mexico closely to U.S. economic trends. As one might expect, the U.S. dog is wagging the tails of its northern and southern neighbors, as data released today attest.
Canadian wholesale sales fell by 4.2% in both value and volume terms in January. The automotive sector dominated the report, with nominal sales plunging 22.9% on the month and 31.9% from January 2008. Between October and January, total, automotive, and all other wholesale sales fell at an annualized rate by 29.8%, 72.0%, and 18.9%.
From Mexico comes news that industrial production fell 2.8% in January and by 11.1% on year. These are the worst results since the Mexican debt crisis in the mid-1990’s. Same-store retail sales fell 1.4% in the year to last month.
Copyright 2009 Larry Greenberg. All rights reserved. No secondary distribution without express permission.
Tags: Canadian Dollar
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Interesting news this morning is that the Canadian dollar rose as a result of an unexpected increase in the Canadian inflation rate to 1.4% for February.
At least it seems unlikely that Canada is headed for deflation.