Mexican economy grows nearly 25% in May as recovery gathers steam

Reuters

Published Jun 17, 2021 02:01PM ET

MEXICO CITY (Reuters) - Mexico's economy grew 24.8% in May compared with the same month last year, as a recovery from a slump induced by the coronavirus pandemic gathered pace, a preliminary estimate published by national statistics agency INEGI showed on Thursday.

A breakdown of the figures showed that secondary activities, which include manufacturing, were up by 36.4% from May 2020. Meanwhile tertiary activities, which encompass the service sector, expanded by 19.8% over the same period.

If the preliminary estimate is confirmed, May's activity was only about 0.4% behind the level reached in February 2020, the last full month before pandemic-related restrictions began to hit the economy, according to an index compiled by INEGI.

INEGI noted that April's data had been revised up to show growth of some 21.6% from the same month in 2020, one percentage point higher than the previous estimate.

The agency also said the preliminary figures pointed to month-on-month economic growth of 0.5% between April and May.