Abstract
In December 1994, when public opinion started to think that economic crises had been vanished forever from the national scenario, the announcement of a new devaluation of Mexican peso shook the pillars upon which an unrestrained optimism had been supported; an optimism which had taken six years to be built in days crumbled down.
This new edition added, however, three novel aspects to the traditional stumbling that as from the 1970’s the Mexican economy experienced: it occurred after the deep structural reform in favor of a broader liberalization of markets and after substantial advances in inflation control and fiscal and monetary disciplines had been accomplished; it demanded severer adjustments, but less prolonged, at the level of economic activity and welfare; and finally, it activated mechanisms that, dragging the financial institutions, risked the balance of payments of the country.
