The Minister of Economy met with executives of the main consumer goods firms, seeking to set expectations to avoid inflationary inertia. The industry warns of recession, taxes and rising costs
The Government is seeking to prevent the instability of the last few weeks in the exchange rate of parallel dollars from causing a new inflationary shock. While adjusting the monetary strategy, the Minister of Economy Luis Caputo met with executives from major consumer goods firms and told them He asked to avoid “preventive” increases in the price listsThe industry took the suggestion but issued warnings about the recession, taxes and rising costs..
Last Thursday, the head of the Treasury met with the CEOs of the companies that produce most of the products that make up the basic basket. The meeting took place while private consulting firms were reporting that The rise in food and beverage prices in the first week of July was the highest in four months.
One of the executives who participated in the meeting told Ámbito that the Government asked to avoid preventive markups, which were common in the event of any increase in parallel dollars during the past year.Caputo ratified the economic direction and confirmed that “in the coming months” a “gradual reduction” of the country’s tax will be carried out.
According to what he was able to find out Ambit, the “deepening” of the monetary strategy and the zero emission plan announced by President Javier Milei Hours later, he was no longer part of the talks.
Breaking the inflationary inertia appears today as one of the great challenges for the Ministry of Economy, which has now set as a new condition for lifting the restriction the convergence of this item to a level close to 0%. Caputo swears that “there are no macroeconomic reasons” for the price advance to persist, but Companies warn that in the meantime costs continue to rise: rates, salaries, inputs.
The industry also points out that the tax burden in the sector is between 40% and 50% of product prices. In this regard, they requested to reduce withholdings or to study an exemption scheme for incremental exports and also presented a proposal to exclude their imports from paying the country tax.
Anyway, The main concern of the business world at the moment is the recession. Sales have not found a bottom and the debate is not about the speed of the recovery, but about whether there will be a recovery or not.
This is another point of analysis for the question of prices. Many firms are delaying increases due to low demand, and some of them even admit to operating below the break-even point. If the quantities are still missing, will the same prices be maintained?
Source: Ambito
