Lower BCRA rates: blender for savings
The possibility of combating runaway inflation in recent months For savers it was almost impossible, since one of the refuges used is the dollar, which, far from rising, was sharply falling. For this reason, investors used the fixed term in pesos, which had a less negative return compared to inflation, although it still did not manage to match it and was more than 10 percentage points below.
Now him BCRA decided not only to lower the monetary policy ratebut also deregulate the minimum interest rates for fixed terms. In this way, the banks have already started setting their own yield for these placements, below 80% TNA.
“We are facing a dramatic drop in the fixed-term rate. This is one very bad news for the fixed-term saver because it would have negative rates against inflation in 12 months,” said the market analyst, Salvador Di Stefano.
Lower rates on loans: is it enough to stop the recession?
The other side of liquidate savers and the BCRA’s paid liabilitiesis to grant you a negative interest rate against inflation to SMEs that take out loans in the future. “It is great news for the reactivation of the economy,” considered Di Stefano.
However, Federico Zirulnikeconomist Scalabrini Ortiz Center for Economic and Social Studies (CESO)explained that Credit demand will depend more on what happens with investment decisions than with the interest rate cut per se.
“In a context where consumption and activity plummet, it is difficult for companies to be willing to make new investments,” analyzed and exemplified with the drop in the installed capacity of the industrywhich in December showed its worst decline since the pandemic.
“There is idle capital. Why am I going to invest in a new machine if I have no one to sell to?“, he asked himself.
There is a possibility that personal loans will begin to be reactivated, but it is a significantly lower amount than that of SMEs. “I don’t think they are enough to move the real economy”He launched.
On the other hand, the economist Federico Glustein He was more enthusiastic about the monetary policy adjustment and stated that the lowering of the rate will generate two situations: those with greater liquidity will go to the CER instrumentswhich will give the Government some predictability to “lower the monetary issue even further” and have greater control of the pesos until the economy “rebounds.”
Meanwhile, also could “motorize consumption a little”according to Glustein, since at deregulate minimum interest rates Private banks can provide a return of less than 80% TNA in the face of inflation close to 15%. Now, they can also offer cheaper bank loans.
“It is a way to put a foot on the recession and try to encourage consumption as well as investment via unsubsidized rates, but lower than inflation”concluded the economist.
Source: Ambito
