To the Secretary of Economic Policy, gabriel rubinstein; and the vice president of the Central Bank, Lisandro Cleri; who arrived in the capital of the United States on Tuesday, were joined this Wednesday by the head of advisers of the Ministry of Economy, Leonardo Madcur; and the Secretary of the Treasury, Raul Rigo.
The negotiations, which will take place over “the next few days”, as an IMF spokesperson commented the day before, could be concluded early next week and the minister Sergio Massa I would travel to finish fastening the understanding with the organism.
IMF report
The IMF published the External Sector Report for the year 2022, which was reviewed by the agency’s board of directors last week.
As far as Argentina is concerned, The technical staff of the multilateral organization warned that fiscal and monetary policies are necessary to ensure projected trade surpluses and improve reserve coverage.
In this framework, they said that the country must implement a “restrictive monetary policy and a simplified exchange regime.”
“Given the scarcity of reserves, foreign currency sales (in the official or parallel market) must be consistent with the reserve accumulation goals, taking into account the variability derived from seasonal factors and temporary episodes of excessive volatility,” the agency added. .
With regard to the ongoing negotiations, one of the points that most interests Argentina involves the advancement of funds from the multilateral organization, in order to strengthen the reserves affected by the impact of the drought on the sector’s exports. agricultural.
The amount that the IMF would advance would be around 8,500 million dollars, according to reports.
The pending funds of the program that Argentina maintains with the IMF for the second half of the year total approximately 10.4 billion dollars.
Argentina requested a partial or total advance of the same, in the middle of the electoral year and due to the effects of the drought, which meant a loss for the country of around 20,000 million dollars.
The IMF confirmed that “The IMF team and an Argentine delegation began face-to-face technical meetings this afternoon in Washington DC, to advance the fifth review of the Fund-supported program. These meetings are expected to continue over the next few days.”
Regarding the points of the negotiation, a spokesman for the agency limited himself to stating that “we will communicate more details in due time.”
Yesterday Massa also held dialogues by zoom with officials from Germany and the United States, with Jörg Kukies, Secretary of State of the German Federal Chancellery and with Myke Pyle, International Economic Advisor of the US National Security Council.
From the Ministry of Economy they maintain that the political support of the United States has been key for the details to be polished and the final agreement to be closer.
Dialogue between Sergio Massa and Kristalina Georgieva
Last weekend, a communication between Massa and the number one of the IMF, Kristalina Georgieva, helped advance the negotiations for the reformulation of the program signed in March 2022, and which have been going on for 3 months.
The head of the Palacio de Hacienda had indicated days ago that Argentina “is very close” to reaching an agreement with the IMF, while remarking that this understanding was going to be achieved “defending the idea of a development country with inclusion, without resigning the capacity sovereignty and without surrendering to the altar of fiscal adjustment”.
“Negotiating with the Fund for these hours – Massa highlighted – requires a proactive look, having the conviction that Argentina is a country with obligations that it complies with, but a sovereign country. The determination to know what is defended when negotiating and the conviction of knowing how to set priorities”.
From the multilateral organization, the IMF spokeswoman, Julie Kozack, stated last Thursday that “the focus of these discussions are alternatives to strengthen the authorities’ program.”
“While recognizing the impact of the drought on the economy, and this includes reviewing policies to safeguard stability, strengthen reserve accumulation, improve fiscal sustainability, and safeguard the most vulnerable,” Kozack argued.
Source: Ambito
