MEXICO CITY: Mexico’s oil revenues amounted to 173.7 billion pesos (some $11.3 billion) in the first quarter of 2015, down 42.6 percent from the same period of 2014, the Finance and Public Credit Secretariat said.
“Oil revenues registered an annual reduction of 42.6 percent. They were 121.6 billion pesos (some $7.9 billion) below the program,” Rodrigo Barros, head of the secretariat’s Tax Revenue Policy Unit, said in a press conference here Thursday.
That decline was the result of a sharp drop in oil prices, “which are far below last year’s levels and the levels used in preparing the 2015 Mexican budget revenue bill,” Barros said.
Oil and natural gas prices fell 48.9 percent and 24.5 percent, respectively, while crude production by Mexican state-owned oil giant Petroleos Mexicanos declined by 7.8 percent.
Barros made his remarks at the presentation of the secretariat’s quarterly report on Mexico’s economic situation, public finances and public debt.
In the same press conference, the head of the secretariat’s Economic Planning of Public Finance Unit, Luis Madrazo, said Mexico’s economy showed “consistent indicators of solid growth” in the first quarter despite a “complex and volatile” international context.
In terms of Mexico’s public finances, revenues came in “better than expected,” in part due to a high level of non-recurrent revenues, Madrazo said.
In real terms (after correcting for the effect of inflation), public-sector revenues were up 9.3 percent in the first quarter relative to the same period of last year, due primarily to 32 percent annual growth in non-petroleum revenues, which offset the decline in oil revenues.
“Mexico remains remarkable among emerging economies for the orderly adjustment of its financial variables in a context of high international market volatility,” Madrazo said.
Despite the boost to public finances from nearly 93 billion pesos in non-recurrent revenues, Mexico still remains highly dependent on oil revenues, which fund roughly a third of government spending.
