The Day at a Glance | February 17 2023

The Top

*The Timely Indicator of Economic Activity (INOE, for its initials in Spanish), points towards a slowdown in activity in December.

*In the US, the import price index logged a setback in January, while export prices accelerated on a monthly basis.

*The Eurozone`s current account closed December with a surplus worth 15.9 billion dollars.

Economic environment

The INEO made public by the INEGI estimates a 2.6% figure for the General Index of Economic Activity (IGAE for its initials in Spanish). This variation implies a slowdown from the previously recorded 3.46% in November, which would link three consecutive downward readings. In a disaggregate manner, the INOE for December already considers the 3.1% figure reported industrial production a week ago, combined with an estimate of 2.1% for tertiary activities. These new estimates differ from the forecasts made known a month ago, which expected an IGAE of 2.7% (-0.1pp) for December, consisting of an estimated 1.2% (-1.9pp) for secondary activities, which was considerably higher, and 2.8% (-0.7pp) for tertiary activities. Likewise, for January`s IGAE, the INEO indicates a rate of 2.8%, comprised of 3.1% for secondary activities and 2.5% for tertiary activities. December`s IGAE figures will be made public next Friday, February 24^th, along with the GDP figure.

In the United States, the import price index fell by -0.2% on a monthly basis, thanks to lower oil prices. This is the seventh consecutive negative reading in this category. However, when excluding energy, the index shows a variation of 0.2%, which compares negatively to the estimated -0.3%, but managed to log a moderation compared to the 0.8% figure seen the previous month. Regarding the export price index, it had a reading of 0.8% on a monthly basis, which, in addition to negatively surprising compared to the expected -0.2%, this is the first record with a positive rate of change since June 2022. Concerning Mexico, the goods exported to our country had a monthly increase of 0.7%, a figure that helps to better understand the numbers made public for local inflation in January.