“The tax collection data for January reflect the continuation of the slowdown in the level of activity that began to be observed from September of last yearwhen all government resources presented a fall in real terms of the order of 2.7% compared to the same month in 2022, while the taxes associated with the internal market exhibited the same dynamics, although to a lesser extent, showing a reduction of 0.1% in constant currency, in the same period”, they pointed out from the Ieral, and detailed that the taxes that are computed in this indicator are VAT, Debits and Credits, Fuels, Contributions and Contributions to Social Security and Import Duties .
“He seasonally adjusted index prepared by IERAL based on the collection of taxes associated with the internal market reflects a real fall of 1.2% per month in January, compared to the month of December. It seems to confirm that the economy continues to follow the deceleration path that began to be observed towards the end of the third quarter of 2022,” added the study signed by Maximiliano Gutiérrez.
“By extrapolating the behavior of the collection associated with the internal market based on the trajectory of economic activity, making up for the lack of official information for December and January, It is found that the EMAE in the last month of 2022 would have had a seasonally adjusted fall of 0.2% versus November, followed by a decrease of 0.8% estimated for January compared to the previous month”, was detailed in the report, in which it was added: “In year-on-year terms, the figures are still positive, but with a marked slowdown. In December the variation against the same month of 2021 was 1.1%, the same figure for January compared to its pair of 2022; However, both months grow 2.5 pp less than the October-November average, latest official data, and 5.8 pp below the January-August 2022 average, confirming the exhaustion of the post-covid economic recovery” .
When explaining the reasons that suggest a slowdown in the level of activity, the study highlights as the main factor the acceleration of inflation which has been observed since last March, a moment from which it was never possible to break through the 5% monthly floor, in addition to the well-known accelerations and decelerations that occurred in recent months, a situation that affects the purchasing power of aggregate demand and, convergingly, the growing difficulties for the supply of parts and pieces of imported origin that lead to restrictions on the supply side”.
projections
In this scenario, different private consultancies made estimates in recent weeks on how the activity can evolve during this year. For example, from the firm Orlando Ferreres they pointed out that the “projections for the year that began anticipate a negative result of the productwith unresolved macroeconomic tensions, with strong limitations due to the lack of foreign currency and with meager private consumption derived from years of contraction in family income”.
For their part, from LCG they had pointed out: “We hope that the activity will suffer from the current drought that affects the 2022/23 campaign, for which a loss of around US$10,000 million is expected, according to the Grain Exchange of Buenos Aires. Consequently, with a lower supply of foreign currency, we expect the import control schemes to be pronounced, which will have its correlate in the availability of inputs for the normal operation of the industry”.
From Ecolatina, meanwhile, they projected for this year “a more limited growth than in 2022”. “We understand that if there were no shocks (exogenous or endogenous) a recession could be avoided, but not the trend towards moderating growth,” they stressed.
By enumerating some of the factors that will affect a “lean expansion” of the economyfrom Ecolatina they detailed: “The fall in agricultural productionwhich will impact, on the one hand, on the level of economic activity due to less activity in the sector and its associated activities, but at the same time will limit the supply of foreign currency throughout the year. Faced with a demanding goal of accumulation of international reserves and the aforementioned drought, the management scheme for the shortage of foreign currency will continue, highlighting the continuity (and eventually strengthening) of the restrictions on imports, which would impose a limit on the expansion of the domestic market (and certain exports) via complications in the supply of finished goods, capital goods and inputs. This would affect not only the levels of consumption, but also of investment”.
Source: Ambito
