From Jorge

This week felt like Baja threw three different headlines at us and dared us to connect them. Movistar quietly stepped out of Mexico, Sam’s Club still hasn’t returned to Cabo a decade after Odile, and Monex just turned 40 with the calm of an institution that plans to be here for another forty. Add in a nostalgic look at the old Baja carriers, Bajacel, Pegaso, Nextel, and suddenly the pattern shows up: the players that stay matter more than the ones that leave. And in a region growing this fast, stability is becoming the rarest commodity.

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Subject of the Week

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Forty years in Mexico’s financial world is no small achievement. Regulations shift, markets swing, and technology moves by the week. Yet here is Banco Monex, marking four decades as one of the country’s key fiduciary institutions, a quiet constant in a landscape that rarely sits still.

Through a regulatory and market lens, Monex plays a central role in the coastal real-estate ecosystem. For thousands of foreign owners, they’re the trustee behind the fideicomisos that make investment possible. For those of us who work in this environment every day, milestone anniversaries like this one matter. They signal stability, the kind you want in an institution entrusted with long-term property rights.

Over the years, in my own dealings with Monex, one thing has been clear: they are steady, professional, and consistent. It’s not about dramatic gestures or grand narratives, it’s about doing the job, honoring commitments, and keeping the system moving in a region where real estate gets more complex every year. In Baja, reliability is currency, and Monex has earned every bit of its reputation.

So today, I want to offer a sincere congratulations to Banco Monex, and especially to the people behind it. Institutions reach milestones, but it’s teams, managers, analysts, representatives, and support staff who make them remarkable. Forty years is their accomplishment.

Here’s to Monex, four decades in, still a solid presence in one of Mexico’s most dynamic regions.

If you’re evaluating fiduciary banks for your property trust, Monex remains a reputable, dependable option.

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There was a time, not that long ago, though it feels like another geological era, when having a mobile phone in Baja was less about coverage and more about hope. Hope the call would go through. Hope the antenna survived the drive to La Paz. Hope the bill didn’t require a second mortgage.

And the names… Baja Cellular, Pegaso, Iusacell, Nextel. Each one sounded like it came straight from a sci-fi novel. They weren’t just carriers, they were characters. Little empires of static and promise that powered the first real wave of connectivity in northern Mexico.

Back then, choosing a carrier felt like picking a team. You were a Baja Cellular person or an Iusacell loyalist. Some people swore by Pegaso because of that per-second billing; others walked around with a Nextel clipped to their belt like a badge of honor, the famous “beep-beep” that made you feel half-executive, half–Secret Service.

Coverage maps were more art than science, polite suggestions rather than guarantees. But somehow, it worked. Those early networks stitched together a region where the road from Tijuana to Cabo still had more goats than gas stations.

But here’s the part we forget: those companies were pioneers. They built their networks one tower at a time, long before “5G” became cocktail-party vocabulary. They kept us connected across deserts, mountains, hurricane seasons, and the occasional bureaucratic adventure. For many of us, our first mobile call in Baja came through one of those now-extinct brands.

And then the world changed. Telcel went national. Movistar went shopping. AT&T arrived with deep pockets and a plan. One by one, the familiar banners came down, folded into global names with bigger budgets, sleeker networks, and less personality. Baja Cellular was absorbed by Telefónica. Pegaso and Iusacell disappeared into Movistar and AT&T. Nextel, king of the push-to-talk era, eventually joined the same fate.

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The mobile landscape modernized. Prices fell. Coverage improved. International plans suddenly made sense. No one complains about roaming between Tijuana and San Diego anymore. Today’s networks are faster, cleaner, and infinitely more reliable.

But something was lost, that quirky, charming, slightly unreliable era when early carriers felt like part of the local fabric. When your phone number said something about where you lived and who your team was. When you knew, by heart, the one street in town where your signal always dropped.

I can’t help but smile thinking about it. Those companies may be long gone, but they built the foundation for everything we do today, from WhatsApps to video calls with clients in Canada or the US, while standing on a dusty lot in Cerritos or the East Cape. They connected Baja before it was fashionable to do so.

And for that, they’ve earned a quiet place in our region’s history

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We had just taken a nostalgic look at Baja’s old mobile carriers, Baja Cellular, Pegaso, Iusacell, Nextel, the pioneers that stitched this region together one antenna at a time. And almost on cue, the present delivered its own plot twist: Movistar is leaving Mexico.

This isn’t noise; it’s a real shift. Through a market and infrastructure lens, Movistar’s exit closes the book on the old three-player model and ushers in a leaner, more consolidated industry. Telcel keeps its wide reach. AT&T becomes the quiet backbone. And the digital newcomers, the virtual operators, suddenly have room to grow.

Movistar didn’t collapse; it recalculated. Spectrum got expensive, profits tightened, and Telefónica chose to place its bets elsewhere, Europe, Brazil, AI. And since Movistar had already been running on AT&T’s network for years, the change feels more like a logo disappearing than a service shutting down.

For Baja users, the day-to-day feels almost identical. Calls still go through. Data still flows. But the landscape underneath is shifting: fewer big brands, more digital carriers, and a new wave of competition about to hit the market.

Why does it matter? Because connectivity is now as essential as water pressure. WhatsApp threads, GPS on the way to La Ventana, all of it depends on stable networks. When a major operator steps out, even quietly, it signals where the industry is headed next.

What’s your move? Switch, stay, or wait to see who steps into the empty space?

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Some Cabo mysteries are harmless, like why every restaurant claims their guacamole is “famous.” Others are more interesting, like how a metro area growing this fast still depends on a single warehouse store.

And the question that keeps resurfacing is this:

How did Sam’s Club, the national heavyweight, disappear after Odile and never return, while Costco became the lone giant… and City Club quietly sits on the sidelines, technically present but never really in the fight?

Let’s take the puzzle from the top.

When Hurricane Odile hit in 2014, Sam’s Club closed and didn’t return. No rebuild. No relaunch. Just gone.

Costco, meanwhile, rebuilt, reopened, and slowly turned into Cabo’s unofficial community center, part grocery run, part social outing, part demographic x-ray. If you ever want to understand who just moved to town, stand in the checkout line.

City Club stayed open, yes, but never emerged as a true competitor. It’s the warehouse store you remember only when you happen to drive past it.

And that leaves Costco carrying the entire load in a market that, frankly, has long since outgrown a one-store setup.

Through a national lens, Sam’s Club should dominate:

174 stores, all 32 states, Walmart logistics behind it. Costco has less than half the footprint.

But Cabo doesn’t behave like the national average.

Costco wins here for one simple reason:

emotional loyalty beats operational dominance.

The food court, the seasonal items, the consistency, it all adds up to a brand Cabo trusts.

Sam’s never built that here.

City Club hasn’t tried.

Yet the bigger story is the one hiding in plain sight:

Cabo’s population, tourism flow, and year-round consumption have outgrown the current warehouse capacity.

This market could support:

Someone will eventually read the signals.

Warehouse behavior is a window into Cabo’s economic health.

One overloaded Costco serving a booming metro area tells us the same thing every time:

Cabo isn’t a seasonal town anymore, it’s a full-scale, fast-growing urban market.

For property owners and investors, that’s a bullish sign.

If Cabo gets a second warehouse store, what would you want?

A new Costco?

Sam’s making a comeback?

City Club waking up?

Write me at [email protected]

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