Google Searches May Signal Trouble for Mexico Election Favorite
Google searches indicate that Obrador might be losing support in his bid to become Mexico’s next president.
(Bloomberg) -- Google searches indicate that Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador might be losing support in his bid to become Mexico’s next president, according to strategists at Citigroup Inc.
The number of times Mexicans typed the frontrunner’s name into the search engine has started to decline this month, a development that could indicate his lead in the polls will fade leading up to the July 1 ballot, according to the bank’s analysts. Searches for second-place candidate Ricardo Anaya have been on the rise, they said.
The election is of critical importance to investors concerned that Lopez Obrador, who is often painted as a left-wing firebrand, will roll back the opening of Mexico’s energy industry along with other efforts to liberalize the economy. He’s led most polls since October, weighing on stocks and the currency.
Anaya, of the business-friendly PAN party, has been battling Jose Antonio Meade of the ruling PRI for second place. Meade’s search data has been trending down, in line with polls that show him falling further behind the other two candidates, according to the Citigroup report.
The bank found that Google search trends better predicted who would win during the last two Mexican Presidential elections than did voter intention polls. More searches for PAN’s Felipe Calderon in 2006 and PRI’s Enrique Pena Nieto in 2012 accurately predicted they would win the presidency even as polls underestimated the candidates’ leads, the analysts said.
The search data, Citigroup strategists led by Julio Zamora say, “argues for caution” when interpreting voter surveys that show Lopez Obrador widening his advantage over Anaya. The analysts’ base-case scenario is that Lopez Obrador won’t be Mexico’s next president.
While search interest in Anaya has been rising faster than his support in polls, the strategists caution that the jump may not be a precursor to climbing the ranks in surveys. Instead, they said, it could signal a decline in support after the candidate’s name was dragged into a money-laundering probe earlier this month.
There are more undecided and no-response voters right now than there have been at this time in previous elections, according to polling data. And Citigroup says it expects a meaningful amount of “strategic voting” to take place this year in which citizens will migrate to whatever candidate they think has the best chance of defeating Lopez Obrador. Such a strategy could work: Amlo’s opponents have more combined support than he has.
To contact the reporter on this story: Michelle F. Davis in Mexico City at mdavis194@bloomberg.net.
To contact the editors responsible for this story: Arie Shapira at ashapira3@bloomberg.net, Brendan Walsh, Christiana Sciaudone
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