In a scenario of Growing fiscal, monetary and exchange tensionthe official numbers of the financial result of the national public sector of 2025 hide a component that, when incorporating, radically transforms the reading of public accounts.
If the interest capitalization of instruments such as LECAPS is considered —A mechanics that the government uses to postpone payments without reflecting them in the immediate cash flow -, The adjusted deficit would have promoted, in July of the current, just over $ 19 billiona jump that puts in check the sustainability of the debt in the medium term. The data arises from a calculation made by Scope based on official data.
An increasingly difficult weight to sustain
Let’s go to the numbers. The data of the Ministry of Economy, published monthly report a financial result based on deficit cash of $ 168,515 million for July. However, This figure does not include interest capitalizationa item that is built from the reports of the Ministry of Finance. Taking official data and turning the values of millions of dollars to pesos with the exchange rate at the close of each month, an additional load is revealed that the treasure accumulates silently.
This arises from instruments whose structure capitalizes interest instead of paying them periodicallyallowing to renew debt to the expiration without impacting the fiscal accounts. The problem is that, although immediate pressure relieves, this postponement moves an unsustainable load to the future by increasing the gross debt stock. An adjusted series, which adds the official financial result with the capitalization of interest, exposes how a significant part of the accruals is not computed, despite being a real obligation.
Based on data from the Ministry of Economy and the Ministry of Finance, it can be seen that the dynamics between July 2024 and July 2025 impacts fully. While the financial result ranges from moderate deficits ($ 466,631 million in August 2024) and more pronounced values ($ 1,557.305 million in January 2025), the capitalization of instruments shows sustained growth, reaching $ 6,361,956 million in June 2025. The adjusted result, which reflects this sum and uses the exchange rate at the end of the last day of each month of each month, It culminates in a deficit of $ 19.2 billion in July, a peak driven by the exchange of fiscal liquidity letters (LEFI) in the BCRA portfolio. This operation, for $ 27.8 billion, involved pre -existing instruments that already capitalized on interest, adding about $ 8 billion to the July load.
Although this effect is expected to decrease in August, Interest rates high suggest that capitalization will continue to exceed previous levels. In the accumulated from January to July 2025, the Government generated a financial income in debt interest – including payments and capitalizations – for $ 56 billion, a figure that, paradoxically, indicates availability of resources, but whose postponement aggravates the fiscal landscape.
A revealing comparison: interests vs. retirements
To dimension the magnitude of this load, it is pertinent to compare it with retirement spending. In July 2025, The disbursement for retirees and pensioners, according to data from the Congress Budget Office (OPC), reached approximately $ 4.6 billion, A figure that contrasts markedly with the $ 19 billion corresponding to the capitalization of interest in the same month, that is, in July. This implies that Interest accrual is very close to quintuplicate the amount assigned to retirees and pensioners.
In the annual accumulated until July, while the interest capitalized and paid total $ 56 billion, the total expenditure on retirement and pensions, according to the OPC, is estimated at around $ 30.1 billion, reaffirming this disproportion.
This imbalance highlights the priorities of fiscal management. The structure of instruments such as LECAPS and the exchange of Lefi prioritize the generation of extraordinary financial income, while retirements face restrictions, with minimal increases that represent an insignificant fraction against the impact of the debt. This approach, which favors rates that triple projected inflation, leaves retirees as the main affected by an adjustment disguised by accounting maneuvers.
Source: Ambito
