Pemex showing signs of life

Austerity and higher prices have helped put the state firm back in the black. Deeper reforms are still needed

"When the president honoured me with heading Pemex a year ago, he gave me two instructions," José Antonio González Anaya, the Mexican national oil company's chief executive, explained earlier this month. "One was to get Pemex's finances in order. The second one was to harvest the historic opportunity of accelerating the energy reform." It's fair to say that González didn't fully grasp the scale of the job. "At that time, I didn't quite understand exactly all the work that we needed to do to get these two challenges done." How is he doing a year later? It has been far from smooth sailing for González and Pemex, but they've notched up some hits. Whipping Pemex's shabby finances into shape was