The US and Mexican stock indices closed April with a negative performance. The technological NASDAQ ended the month with a loss of 13.30%, its biggest monthly drop since the 2008 financial crisis. For the Mexican benchmark, the S&P/BMV IPC, it was its worst month since March 2020.
The S&P 500 fell 8.80% in April, marking the lowest monthly performance since March 2020. While the Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 4.91%.
In the last session of the fourth month of the year, US stocks ended up sinking. NASDAQ adjusted 4.20%, to 12,334.64 units and accumulating a drop of 21.16% in this 2022. Friday’s loss for the S&P 500 index was 3.6%, to 4,131.93 integers, which remains 13.31% down this year and the Dow Jones lost 2.8%, to close at 32,977.21 points, with an annual drop of 9.25 percent.
“The markets remain negative in 2022 because high inflation persists that will generate further increases in interest rates, concern about the economic and financial effects of the conflict between Russia and Ukraine, in addition to greater confinements in China that have caused negative effects. adverse in supply chains. Some reports from the first quarter of 2022 helped to offset the volatility, however, the expectations of companies are modest for 2022”, explained Roberto Solano, coordinator of Stock Market Analysis at Monex.
In Mexico, the index of the Mexican Stock Exchange, S&P/BMV IPC, was adjusted downward by 9.05%, while in the first four months of this 2022 it remains down 3.5 percent. The FTSE-Biva, of the Institutional Stock Exchange, fell 8.71% in April and in the year its decline is 3.33 percent.
The companies in the United States that fell the most in April were Netflix (-49.18%), NVIDIA (-32.03%), PayPal (-23.97%), Amazon (-23.75%) Tesla (-19.19%), as well as Disney (- 18.61%), Alphabet (-17.8%) and Meta (-9.84%).
In Mexico, the shares of Grupo México (-19.73%), Inbursa (-16.99%), Cemex (-16.00%), Walmart de México y Centroamérica (-11.91%) were bearish last month. Those that closed with monthly gains within the S&P/BMV IPC were Bimbo (+4.73%), Becle (+3.92%), Kimberly-Clark de México (+1.82%), Coca-Cola FEMSA (+1.59%) and Liverpool ( +1.40%).
“The poor performance of the Mexican market occurs as a contagion effect of greater risk aversion generated at a global level, given the expectation of a more aggressive monetary stance from the Federal Reserve to combat inflationary pressures. The quarterly results already published by companies give mixed signals, since on the one hand they register growth in sales, but at the same time they adjust their forecasts for the rest of the year downwards”, said Gabriela Siller, director of Economic Analysis at Banco Base.
Weight loses and oil gains during the fourth month
The peso closed April with a depreciation of 2.28% or 45.42 cents, trading around 20.40 pesos per dollar, with the exchange rate touching a minimum of 19.7274 and a maximum of 20.6378 pesos.
Gabriela Siller, director of Economic Analysis at Banco Base, wrote that the performance of the exchange rate in April can be divided into two parts. In the first half of the month, the peso showed a lateral behavior, with the market testing the support of 19.80 pesos per dollar, while the participants were waiting for relevant economic information.
During the second half, the exchange rate showed an upward trend to a maximum of 20.6378 pesos per dollar.
According to Siller, speculation about the future of monetary policy in the United States put pressure on the Mexican currency.
Other currencies that depreciated in the month were the Brazilian real, which lost 4.91%, followed by the Colombian peso, which had a loss of 6.19%, and the Chilean peso, which depreciated 8.55 percent.
On the other hand, the Russian ruble was the emerging currency with the highest gain against the US, with an appreciation in the fourth month of 2022 of 12.73 percent.
In the oil market, benchmarks ended April with high volatility.
The European North Sea Brent lost 0.71% and is trading at 107.14 dollars a barrel, while the American West Texas Intermediate (WTI) gained 4.40% at 104.69 dollars a barrel.
The Mexican export mix closed April with an advance of 4.10% to 102.02 dollars a barrel.
In April, WTI reached a maximum of 109.81 dollars per barrel and a minimum of 92.93 dollars.
The upward pressure for energy came from the interruption of natural gas flows from Russia to Poland and Bulgaria, since those countries refused to pay in rubles as required by the government of Vladimir Putin.
An analysis by Banco Base explains that according to the European Commission, the system fails to comply with sanctions on transactions with the central bank.