Chilean exports hit $100 billion milestone as copper stumbles

Chilean exports crossed the US$100 billion threshold for the first time in history during the first ten months of the year, a milestone that, paradoxically, arrives accompanied by signs of fragility that significantly temper its significance. According to Banco Central figures, shipments accumulated between January and October reached US$104.124 billion, a 16.6% year-on-year increase that puts the country on track for a new annual record. But the aggregate figure conceals an internal fracture: copper exports —the historic pillar of the Chilean economy— fell 5.4% in October versus the same month a year earlier, their second decline of the year, while capital goods imports have now posted six consecutive months of contraction, an unmistakable sign that private investment has yet to take off.

What sustains the export record is not copper but a constellation of minerals that have been revalued amid geopolitical shifts and the global energy transition. Lithium shipments total US$5.171 billion through October, a 165% year-on-year increase and its strongest performance since the 2022 price peak, with carbonate accounting for 74% of the total at an average price of US$18,850 per ton. Gold contributes another US$3.740 billion, expanding 65%, driven both by record prices and sustained growth in domestic production. Silver, for its part, climbed 118% year-on-year. Chile is exporting more than ever, but it is doing so increasingly less thanks to Codelco and increasingly more thanks to a diversified portfolio the country is only just beginning to manage strategically.

Copper's weakness encapsulates one of the moment's most urgent problems: Codelco, whose output has been questioned over accounting duplications and cost overruns on structural projects, now faces a second investigative commission unanimously approved by the Chamber of Deputies. The initiative, led by Deputy Daniel Valenzuela with 62 signatures, will broaden the scrutiny to union loans —which exceeded 25 billion pesos— and to project budgets with unexplained overruns and delays. The Socialist Party accused that the media exposure of the irregularities aims to discredit the copper miner in order to facilitate the sale of assets "at liquidation prices," a tension that reveals just how politicized the debate over the future of Latin America's most important state-owned enterprise has become.

Meanwhile, in the markets, the session was dominated by the combination of a sharp drop in oil prices —Brent gave up 4.67% to US$93.74, pulling away from US$100 following Donald Trump's remarks on the unlikelihood of new attacks against Iran— and a dollar that closed near $970, accumulating a loss of roughly $27 in two weeks. The IPSA extended its recovery toward 10,600 points, with Latam Airlines among the day's standout performers: the airline has gained 17% since late October, benefiting directly from cheaper fuel, which represents its largest operating cost. The question Diario Financiero raises is pertinent: how much of that saving will actually flow through to earnings, given the company's hedging contracts and cost structure.

The decline in oil, however, arrives too late to contain a domestic political crisis. 93-octane gasoline is on the verge of surpassing its all-time high of $1,546, and truckers have staged days of protests in the central-south zone. President José Antonio Kast's government responded with an urgent bill to cap fuel price increases at $20 per liter for 90 days, with a $40-per-liter cap for this week. It is a containment measure with real fiscal cost to the treasury, which is already operating on a narrow margin. Sebastián Izquierdo, vice president of the CFA, warned precisely that: "The debt figure as of September is not an alert, but it does show there is little room left." Hacienda projects it will meet the fiscal target this year, but difficulties for the following periods are mounting.

That fiscal strain spilled literally onto the floor of Congress. The Chamber of Deputies approved the 2027 Budget in general terms, with 80 votes in favor and 63 against, in a session that escalated to an unusual level of confrontation when Finance Minister Jorge Quiroz publicly criticized lawmakers, telling them that "most of you are talking for the reel, talking for social media," a statement that drew public rebuke from the chamber's president, Jorge Alessandri, in an extraordinarily rare gesture. The budget grows only 1.5% in real terms, with no meaningful demand impulse, in a year when unemployment reached 9.8% —its highest level in five years— and September's Imacec barely advanced 0.2% as a result of a 12.1% drop in mining. Non-mining Chile is growing, but slowly.

Against that backdrop of fiscal tightness and labor pressure, the debate over pension funds took on a concrete dimension: the regulator authorized AFPs to recalculate the programmed withdrawals of those who retired between July and September, a period in which Fund E recorded a real loss of 10.39%. A UDP study suggests the administrators' new investment scheme would have limited that damage for up to 88% of affiliates, although the Chamber nevertheless advanced the admissibility of a direct compensation bill that economists have described as technically deficient.

On the near-term horizon, there are multiple events to watch. The October CPI reading in the United States —scheduled for Tuesday and estimated at 0.3% month-on-month— will set the course for the dollar and, by extension, for the local exchange rate. The line-by-line discussion of the 2027 Budget will extend through Thursday in the Chamber, with a hardened opposition and the Rabat affair as political background noise. The truckers' meeting in Concepción on Wednesday will determine whether the strike deepens or whether the government's $20-per-liter proposal manages to defuse the conflict. And on the corporate front, the award of the Isidora 3000 building —contested among Confuturo, Credicorp, Ameris, and the Falcom-Territoria alliance— could close before year-end, in a signal about real appetite for top-tier real estate assets in an economy that is still trying to convince investors that its growth-friendly signals will ultimately translate into action.