La Jornada: Investment and certainty, keys to increasing growth: BBVA

Although banking in Mexico remains solid, the low dynamism of investment continues to be the main obstacle for the economy to achieve higher growth rates, warned Eduardo Osuna Osuna, vice president and general director of BBVA México, the bank with the largest presence in the country.

The manager pointed out that credit has shown mixed signs at the start of the year, with lower demand in some segments, but with signs of recovery in the coming months. “We are seeing lower demand and we hope that business credit will begin to accelerate,” he explained.

Economic performance, he added, will depend largely on the federal government’s infrastructure projects. “If we are able to execute the infrastructure plans – that will be seen in the second half – it will be the main variable for the year’s growth,” he stated.

However, achieving that goal will require a significant acceleration in the second half of the year. “If we want to reach that 1.8 percent, in the second semester we must grow above 2 or 2.3 percent; it is difficult, but not impossible,” said the manager.

Osuna stressed that to trigger investment, in addition to the execution of public spending, it will be essential to strengthen the confidence of the private sector.

“The logic is to combine the execution of Plan Mexico with messages of certainty to the private investor; only then will we see greater growth,” he noted in a conference this week on the occasion of the presentation of the bank’s results.

According to data from the Ministry of Finance and Public Credit (SHCP), at the end of the first quarter, the physical investment of the federal government, which is the expenditure destined to create, expand or improve infrastructure and durable assets, totaled 179 thousand 554 million pesos, a drop of 15.6 percent, in real terms, compared to the 204 thousand 294 million reported in the same period of 2025.

However, in March there was a rebound of 92,495 million pesos, an advance of 69.8 percent compared to the 52,088 million reported in the month of the previous year.

For the director of BBVA Mexico, the most relevant component of investment in the country is national private capital; Therefore, the perception of the institutional environment is decisive. “The most important component is national private investment, and that is where internal uncertainty has to be reduced,” he highlighted.

In that sense, he specified that the weakness of growth is directly linked to the lack of investment, and factors such as uncertainty about rules and conditions have led some investors to postpone decisions while waiting for clearer conditions to bet their capital.

In February, the Ministry of Finance and Public Credit (SHCP) presented the Infrastructure Investment Plan for Development with Wellbeing.

Its objective is that this year an additional 722 billion pesos will be injected into the 900 billion pesos contemplated in the budget as public investment, and by 2030 the figure will cumulatively rise to 5.6 trillion pesos of mixed investment (public and private).