EL PASO, Texas (Border Report) – If mid-year trends hold, Mexico at the end of 2025 will lose almost $4 billion in money sent by its citizens living abroad.
That 5.8 percent drop in remittances compared to 2024 is due to a sum of factors led by a drastic change in migration policies in the United States, which is where 97 percent of Mexicans living abroad send money to their extended family, according to a report released this month by the BBVA Foundation.
“It is estimated Mexico will receive $61 billion in remittances,” in 2025 according to the report from a foundation whose parent company Banco Bilbao Vizcaya Argentaria has a strong presence in Mexico and South America. “There has been uncertainty about remittances since November 2023, as less Mexican migrants have entered the U.S. job market.”
President Donald Trump’s closing of the border to asylum-seekers and economic migrants and the expectation of increased arrests by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) is likely contributing to that slowdown.
“Remittances are a product of migration and reflect the link that people have with their country of origin,” the foundation stated in its report. “Across Latin America and the Caribbean, most countries have recorded considerable growth in remittances received since 2021. One such case would be Mexico … However, it is thought that this trend could begin to unwind as of 2025, mainly due to political and economic factors in the United States.”
CEMLA, a Mexico City financial policy think-tank, concurs on the impact fear of deportation is having on Mexican workers in the United States.
“Employment of Mexican immigrant workers contracted in the U.S. in the first five months of 2025. Such trend could reflect that some undocumented did not show up to their jobs for fear of being deported,” CEMLA reported last month.
In addition, every dollar sent from the U.S. to Mexican communities buys less now than six months ago by the family receiving a remittance, the foundation reported. That is because the value of the peso has increased – $1 was worth 18.53 pesos on Wednesday, compared to 20.50 on Jan. 20, 2025.
Fewer remittances will impact a Mexican economy whose $64.7 billon inflow last year represented 3.7 percent of its gross domestic product.
The impact will be felt primarily in the homes of families and the economy of towns in five states and in Mexico City. BBVA reports Michoacan, Guanajuato and Jalisco received $5 billion in remittances from the U.S. last year. Mexico City got $4.9 billion and the southern state of Chiapas nearly $4.2 billion, BBVA Foundation found.
“For those households receiving remittances, these represent more than 30 percent of total income,” the foundation reported.
Such households tend to be low-income (48 percent of those who receive remittances) and not located in an urban setting.
The loss of that 30 percent of income when the wage-earner in the United States is deported could be catastrophic for those families. But it will not break the economy of Mexico.
The 3.7 percent chunk of GDP they represent in Mexico pales in comparison with Nicaragua’s 26.6 percent; Honduras’ 25.7 percent; El Salvador’s 24.1 percent; Guatemala’s 19.1 percent; and Haiti’s 18.9 percent.
A big drop in remittances in those countries could lead to additional poverty and health challenges, according to the Center for Global Development.
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