Contacts with the US accelerate to advance with the IMF

The underlying question is whether the IMF will be able to accept adding Argentina to that program but without the structural reforms (labor, tax and even pension) as a bargaining chip for a longer repayment period. The logic of these programs is the same that should have prevailed (and did not) in the times of former President Macri: the IMF grants financial support in exchange for measures that aim to "normalize" the financial account and be implemented with those resources. the balance of payments, that is, everything that is related to the administration, income and expenditure of dollars.

But the most precious souvenir that the Argentine negotiators brought in their suitcase is a booklet of a few pages called " who is who ”, where beyond the misleading tautology, what is instructive is what the Argentine ambassador to the United States, Jorge Argüello, anticipated a few days ago, when in the framework of a meeting generated by the Chamber of Commerce of the The United States in Argentina (Amcham), the official said that the meetings in Washington included, at the same time, meetings with representatives of the Treasury Department, not only with the IMF. Strictly speaking, the contacts now appear as a permanent triangulation. The Government has drawn up its schedule to establish meetings with the IMF, the US Treasury, where the US representative in the IMF also appears. The common denominator is the United States, of course. It was no coincidence that just a few days ago, the Minister of the Economy, Martín Guzmán, held a working meeting with the executive director of the United States before the IMF, Mark Rosen, in a virtual meeting. Contact was made 24 hours after President Alberto Fernández also had a 35-minute telephone conversation with the President-elect of the United States, Joseph Biden. That same week, it became common knowledge that Biden himself planned to appoint Janet Yellen as Secretary of the Treasury. Yellen, who would replace Steve Mnuchin, had been president of the Federal Reserve during the administration of Barack Obama. The Government understands that negotiation with the IMF (we must add contacts with the US Treasury) is key in several aspects: on the one hand, it allows it to strengthen its anti-devaluation position to the extent that with the passing of the days the expectation is accelerated to be closing some draft agreement, a letter of intent. That would give it additional support, a kind of push to reach the time of the liquidation of agriculture (which has some US $ 5 billion left to liquidate from the old harvest, as we recorded today in the edition of Ámbito). The gap between the cash with liquidation, the blue and the official is narrowing, which leaves the makers of the financial roller without fuel. On the other hand, the Templeton and PIMCO funds are stringing together bond bids for US $ 750 million. The question is, what type of conditioning will the IMF-US Treasury place when setting the BCRA's exchange policy, what type of intervention will it be able to continue (or not) in the stock market to play in the spot market with clearance. A rebound in the prices of the financial and blue dollars (all in the area of ​​$ 142- $ 147) could unsettle the most delicate variable: inflation.