Moody's estimates $10 billion in annual support for Pemex for at least three years

Moody's Ratings estimates the federal government will have to transfer at least $10 billion a year to Pemex for a minimum of three years, and as many as five if its operations do not improve, according to Forbes México, which reported on September 24 the projections the rating agency presented at its Inside LatAm: México 2026 event.

Roxana Muñoz, senior vice president of Ratings at Moody's, explained that the floor for that support is the oil company's debt maturities, calculated at about $4.8 billion for 2027 and around $9 billion for 2028, after the 2026 amortization peak. The rating agency estimates that Pemex's adjusted debt stood at about $97 billion in June, with closer to $84 billion in pension liabilities and $21.5 billion with suppliers. In parallel, El CEO reported that Renzo Merino, the firm's vice president of Sovereign Risk, put the fiscal deficit near 5% of GDP when fuel subsidies are included, above the 4.0% to 4.5% range forecast for 2026. Merino added that if Pemex pays with federal transfers, the oil company's debt falls and pressure on the sovereign's accounts rises.

The diagnosis is not only financial. Muñoz calculated that the operating deficit the government will have to cover averages about $10 billion a year through 2028, with main fields posting an average annual decline of close to 23% and proven reserves equivalent to about nine years of production, roughly 40% lower than a decade ago. In refining, the rating agency was seeing losses near $5 billion that, with price volatility, run between $5 billion and $6 billion. The nine to ten mixed contracts identified so far help stabilize production for two or three years, without guaranteeing a sustained increase over the longer term.

Muñoz argued that Pemex's self-sufficiency depends on generating enough cash to pay debt and operating expenses without recurring government support. The next data point to watch is the 2026 amortization profile, the company's peak of maturities, and how that burden shows up in the fiscal space available to the Secretaría de Hacienda.

This article was written with the assistance of artificial intelligence from verified sources and reviewed by a human editor before publication.