Benchmark
Why Lower Oil Prices Don't Hurt Mexico as Much as They Used To
Reduced dependence on crude makes impact from drop smaller
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The tumble in global oil prices has sent Mexico's currency to a record low and forced the nation to cut spending and raise interest rates. Yet for all the focus on crude, Latin America's second-largest economy is actually less dependent on oil revenue than at any time in the past decade.
The chart below shows the percentage of the federal budget that comes from oil sales. While they've traditionally funded more than one third of the government's spending, that contribution dropped to less than 20 percent last year.