The Mexican peso was on course for one of its biggest weekly drops in several decades, as a rally in the dollar heaped pressure on the currency, which had already endured a turbulent week after recent elections.
The peso, one of the most liquid emerging market currencies, weakened as much as 2.3 per cent against the US dollar in Friday morning trading.
That left the peso down about 7.6 per cent against the dollar for the week, as markets digested an unexpectedly large victory for president-elect Claudia Sheinbaum and the country’s ruling leftwing party that has promised radical changes to the constitution.
The peso’s weekly drop was on course to be its biggest since the start of the Covid-19 pandemic, but also one of its largest drops in more than 30 years, according to Financial Times analysis of LSEG data.
Friday’s move followed a rally in the buck after an unexpectedly strong jobs report and as ruling Morena party coalition lawmakers said they would press ahead with a wide-ranging package of reforms proposed by President Andrés Manuel López Obrador.
In his morning news conference on Friday, López Obrador responded to the market turmoil by saying that “justice is more important than the markets.
“It’s like when you have to choose between the law and justice. People want this.”