Mexico’s top central banker: Mexican banks robust, have sufficient cash

MERIDA, Mexico (Reuters) – Bank of Mexico Governor Victoria Rodriguez vouched for the country’s banking system on Thursday, calling it robust and sufficiently liquid, just days after banking woes struck lenders abroad, sparking fears of wider contagion.

The head of Banxico, as the Mexican central bank is called, spoke at an annual banking conference in the southern city of Merida.

Rodriguez insisted in prepared remarks that the crisis hitting the banking sector in the United States and Europe, which includes the collapse of Silicon Valley Bank and market turmoil that ensnared Swiss lender Credit Suisse, is not expected to impact Mexican banks.

Rodriguez, a former deputy finance minister who was tapped to lead Mexico’s monetary authority by President Andres Manuel Lopez Obardor in late 2021, added Mexico’s banks are well positioned to fuel growth going forward.

As many global supply chains faced bottlenecks in recent years, Mexico has clear advantages for nearshoring, Rodriguez said.

Nearshoring is the trend of moving production closer to North American buyers and away from Asia, where supply-chain snarls during the pandemic overshadowed the region’s low-cost advantage.

(Reporting by Valentine Hilaire and Noe Torres; Editing by Sandra Maler and Christopher Cushing)