In dialogue with Ámbito, Alfredo González, president of the Argentine Confederation of Medium-Sized Enterprises (CAME) expressed positive expectations: “We want it to work.” When asked what benefit the new system will have, he said: “Now you will have the payment date, for what day you will have to have the money in the bank for imports, that gives certainty, which in this context is not little bit”.
In addition, González talked about simplicity. “Now you are not going to have to go through the second procedure of going on a pilgrimage to the Central Bank, Everything in Economy will be more organized”. Until now, companies had to go through two filters: first the Ministry of Commerce, to see if imports have automatic or non-automatic licenses, and then the Central Bank, based on how good it was and if the company had a quota, defined what type of SIMI it was. In the event that the so “feared” SIMI B came out, it meant that companies have to seek financing, since they access dollars 180 days after the merchandise arrives, something very difficult for an SME.
In this way, the organization is centralized by the Secretary of Commerce, in charge of Matías Tombolini, over and above what the Central Bank ended up defining, headed by Miguel Pesce. Meanwhile, the SME chambers are sending Commerce forms with the most urgent cases that need to be unblocked to avoid plant stoppages and personnel suspensions.
Secondly, the companies maintain the expectation that another two announcements will be made in the face of October. On the one hand, that imports be made more flexible for “21 thousand CUIT” of SMEs that import up to US$2 million per year. In other words, the criterion to enable the dollars will not be comparing the imports of the company against its performance in previous years, but with access for up to US$2 million. For the other, that the AFIP carry out a “segmentation” in terms of interest rates for tax debt, with a drop in the case of SMEs. In any case, these measures have not yet been confirmed by Economy, but SMEs expect them to arrive when the “soybean dollar” ends.
From the Argentine Chamber of Commerce (CAC) they assured Ámbito that they have “hope” that the changes in the import system “alleviate the difficult situation that many SMEs are going through that have to stop their production processes while waiting to be able to acquire those capital goods and inputs. In addition, from the chamber chaired by Mario Grinmann they reported that more than 85% of what the country imports are capital goods and supplies. “We agree that the new SIMI system aims to be simpler and more transparent in order to provide predictability to SMEs that need to import. Entrepreneurs need certainty about the rules of the game to organize our companies and supply demand.”
“Hopefully this will order,” added a source from the General Confederation of Entrepreneurs (Cgera). The expectation is that the new system shortens the terms of the SIMI B, which must be financed within 180 days. They assure that in many cases they are inputs that have non-automatic licenses because at some point they were manufactured in the country, but no longer, or on the contrary, the import of inputs or capital goods that are already produced in the country is authorized, which which they consider to be “unfair competition”. Basically, what is expected is that the “arbitrariness” in access to a foreign trade dollar, just above $150, will end.
lack of quotas
For his part, Alberto Pérez, from the Association of Machine Manufacturers (AAFMHA) assured that he hopes that the shortening of SIMI B payment terms will be for the companies that were left without a quota not because they imported more in quantities, but “In cases where there were increases in international prices of commodities, or freight, or by comparison with 2021 and 2020, years of pandemic, which are not parameters either.” Although chambers such as the metallurgists grouped in Adimra requested information on what the monthly quota of each company is, they were unable to access that information.
Source: Ambito
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