Investment Group Aims to Develop $3B Mexico-Canada Trade Corridor

Proposed North America trade corridor route from Mazatlan, Mexico through the U.S., with extension also to Winnipeg, Manitoba IMAGE: Caxxor Group

International financial conglomerate Caxxor Group is putting the final touches on development details for its ambitious plan to build a privately funded North American shipping and trade corridor, a top executive tells ENR.

Carlos Ortiz, general director of the infrastructure and investment firm founded in Mexico but based now in London, says it will be ready to go public in January with the construction and operations team that will build and operate the proposed 4,300-mile-long trade and shipping route connecting Mexico and Canada.

The infrastructure and investment giant is looking to raise $3.3 billion for the project, dubbed T-Mec, which would cut through Texas, Oklahoma and Illinois on its way to Winnipeg, Manitoba. The plan’s main investment backer is U.S.-based National Standard Finance investment fund, he says.

Under the proposal, Caxxor and investors would pump $1 billion into building a major new port on Mexico’s Pacific coast in Mazatlán that the company hopes would become second only to the port of Los Angeles-Long beach, Calif., handling as much as 8 million containers a year.

Caxxor plans to kick off work on the first phase of the project late next year. That will involve building out the port and connecting it to major highways and rail networks by building a $600-million rail link over the Sierra Madre Occidental mountain range in northwest Mexico.

The investment firm envisions the new port eventually becoming the second largest on the West Coast after Long Beach-Los Angeles. In a second phase, plans call for building logistics and terminal facilities in Winnipeg as well.

Caxxor also says it plans to establish Panama, Miami and Mexico City as key bases for infrastructure planning.

“Shipping companies and users see the opportunity to achieve a great port for Mexico,” Ortiz says. “It is a very attractive and well-structured project.”

But an online report in September by a Mexican business publication pointed to possible wariness of investment in Mexico, citing U.S. State Dept. and business group warnings of uncertain government policy response to COVID-19 economic impact.

Scott Van Voorhis writes regularly for ENR about risk management, insurance, and the Canadian engineering, construction and infrastructure sectors. He launched his own freelance writing business in 2008 after nearly two decades as a reporter and business columnist for the Boston Herald, Boston Business Journal and The Eagle-Tribune.