How Mexico and the North got here, year by year, with the sources.
The USA is Mexico's largest customer, and since 2023 Mexico has been the USA's largest trading partner in goods; Canada, the third partner in the agreement, appears wherever the data allow. The bond was built one crisis and one agreement at a time. This site keeps the long record in one place, in English and in Spanish: what happened, what moved between the two sides, and what the experts expected before it did.
The record runs to the last complete year, and the blog sets each new release against it. For this week's numbers there is a sister site; this one is for how we got here.
Sources: U.S. Census Bureau, Trade in Goods with Mexico (public domain) · World Bank, World Development Indicators (updated 8 Oct 2026; CC BY 4.0) · UN DESA Population Division, International Migrant Stock 2024 (CC BY 3.0 IGO)
↔ Swipe sideways to see the whole chart.
Source: U.S. Census Bureau, Trade in Goods with Mexico (public domain)
Where to start
Blog
Each new release set against the long record: what it was before, what the experts expected, and where it sits.
Timeline
Nineteen dated turning points from 1982 to 2025, each with its source and the numbers it moved.
Mexico and the North
Trade, remittances, investment, people and the peso, over decades and in both directions.
What the experts expected
Every IMF forecast for Mexico's growth and inflation since 1990, beside what happened.
Library
The reports, guides, datasets and books on Mexico's economy, dated and linked.
Agencies
Who reports on Mexico, what they publish, how often, and their record where we have it.
About
What this site is, who keeps it, and how every number is handled.
Why 1982
In August 1982 Mexico told its creditors it could not pay. The closed economy financed by oil ended that year, and everything on this site follows from the opening that came after: the GATT, NAFTA, an autonomous central bank, the peso crisis, USMCA. Some series start later because the agencies started later; each chart says where its numbers begin.
Start with the timeline.