PESD releases case study of Pemex, Mexico's national oil company

PESD has just released an 87-page case study of Petróleos Mexicanos (Pemex), Mexico's national oil company. In "The Void of Governance: An Assessment of Pemex's Performance and Strategy," researcher Ognen Stojanovski examines how the state-owned company functions and details some of the profound challenges faced by reformers.

Mexico's Petróleos Mexicanos, or Pemex, is the world's third-ranked company by oil production. Almost 40% of the Mexican government budget is derived from Pemex revenues, leaving the country highly exposed to a drop in oil prices and the company itself strapped for cash to support much-needed investment. At the same time, the company has been progressively de-skilled over the decades by an exclusive focus on financial returns for the government, constitutional restrictions on foreign participation in the oil sector, and suffocating interference by diverse government agencies and the powerful workers' union.