Road, Rail Sectors See Market Gains

As Mexico’s automotive and mining sectors continue with ongoing reactivations, new opportunities for the country’s logistics sector begin to take shape. T21 reported on Monday that certain key transportation companies have posted favorable figures in the stock market for the month of May, showing a positive positioning in the midst of the slow road to recovery from COVID-19 shutdowns. 

One of the bigger winners was Grupo México Transportes. The company accomplished a 13.5 percent growth in its stock price from US$1.01 to US$1.15. Grupo México Transportes, listed as GMXT, is the logistics and transportation subsidiary of Mexico’s corporate giant and major mining sector player Grupo México. It advertises itself as the largest and most profitable rail cargo company in Mexico.  Another winner is US-based Kansas City Southern, which operates significant volumes of rail cargo within Mexico and the US. Kansas City Southern saw its stock price rise 10.7 percent during May, from US$136 to US$150.52. A lesser but no less significant increase came from another American transboundary rail logistics player, Union Pacific, with a 4.8 percent increase in its stock price for May from US$162.14 to US$169.86. If the category is broadened to include all logistics and transportation companies managing traffic through different means across the US-Mexico border, the biggest winner is XPO Logistics with a 14.1 percent increase in its stock price for the month of May, from US$69.08 to US$78.81. 

Returning to purely national companies, road transportation and logistics player Grupo Traxión reported flat results by the end of May, managing to keep the needle at US$0.58 per stock. This kind of result allows Mexico’s road-focused logistics companies to breathe a sigh of relief and start thinking once again about future investments, as evidenced in another T21 report on Orbis Logistic’s plans to continue investing in unit acquisition throughout the COVID-19 crisis.