The quarter that came back
Mexico's economy grew 1.4 per cent in the second quarter against the first, recovering the 0.3 per cent contraction of the revised first quarter, and 2.1 per cent against a year earlier. The reading came in under the preliminary 1.5 per cent published a month ago. That revision is small enough to leave the shape intact: the quarter recovers a level.[1]
All three of the main sectors INEGI tracks expanded, and the primary group — farming, fishing and mining — led at 2.4 per cent. The breadth is real, and the ranking tells you which activities carried the quarter.[1]
Where the price series parts company
The price release published the same day moved annual inflation from 3.10 per cent to 3.26 per cent in the first half of August, inside the Bank of Mexico's target of 3 per cent plus or minus one percentage point. Core inflation reached 3.93 per cent, above the headline. Over the fortnight consumer prices rose 0.10 per cent and the core index 0.08 per cent.[2]
A core reading above the headline puts the remaining price pressure in the part of the basket that domestic costs and margins set, while the volatile items hold the headline down. That would fit a quarter in which income was restored: spending returns, and the prices that respond to it are the ones core is built to capture. The competing reading is at least as strong. Energy and farm prices can fall on their own schedule and drag the headline below a core that never moved much, and this fortnight's figures do not separate the two.[1], [2]
The signal that separates them
The gap to watch is the one between core at 3.93 per cent and the headline at 3.26 per cent. If the third quarter holds the level the second one restored and no fresh energy shock arrives, core should still be running above the headline in the price publications through 30 November 2026. A core reading that drops below the headline over that window would mean the volatile items were doing the work all along, and the demand reading falls with it.[2]