© Archyde.com/AGUSTIN MARCARIAN
Pedestrians walk through the financial center of Buenos Aires, Argentina
BUENOS AIRES, March 17 (Archyde.com) – Argentina’s financial center operated selectively on Thursday with attention focused on the Senate session, where the government’s agreement with the IMF is expected to gain political support and become law.
The Argentine Senate debates the version agreed between the administration of President Alberto Fernández and the credit institution to restructure a debt of 45,000 million dollars, with which the country seeks to leave behind a long financial crisis.
“After the approval of the agreement with the IMF, which is discounted, the attention of investors moves to the political scenario that will leave the validation of the indebtedness as balance”, said the economist Gustavo Ber.
He added that following the vote, “the configuration of the political map might be anticipated on the way to next year’s elections, which would further complicate the implementation of fiscal and monetary strategies with associated costs, although they are essential to move to a ‘macro’ convergence and meet disbursement targets.
The senators debated the understanding amid tensions within the ruling coalition and just three days before the South American country is due to face the payment of some 2,000 million SDRs (regarding 2,800 million dollars) before the credit institution.
The IMF’s executive board will discuss the Argentine issue following it obtains congressional approval, IMF spokesman Gerry Rice said in Washington.
* The S&P Merval stock index grew by 2.51%, to 89,645.88 points as a provisional closing, which adds to the strong rise of 4.04% noted the day before. Stocks in the energy and financial segments led the market improvement.
* “Today (Thursday) the vote will take place in the Chamber of Senators where the government will seek to approve the bill related to the technical agreement with the IMF, with the government showing optimism regarding the outcome,” said the financial Grupo SBS.
* The agreement establishes a grace period of four and a half years, and extends disbursement payments to 10 years, so that the country will begin to pay off the debt in 2026 and will end in 2034, with quarterly revisions of the goals. .
* For their part, bonds in the over-the-counter segment improved by 0.2% on average, in an unstable business circuit due to speculative purchases of portfolios awaiting approval from Congress, operators said.
* The Argentine country risk of the JP. Morgan bank was rearranged with a drop of 18 basic points, to 1,762 units towards the close of the local market (2000 GMT). The indicator traded at around 1,080 basis points at its reset in September 2020 following a million-dollar debt swap and reached a maximum of 1,991 units at the beginning of the previous week.
* The geopolitical crisis due to the war in Ukraine and the recent rise in rates by the Federal Reserve have become two guidelines with a high impact on emerging markets such as Argentina.
* In the exchange market, the wholesale peso ended with a drop of 0.09%, to 109.51/109.52 per dollar, with regulation by the central bank (BCRA).
* Operators estimated that the monetary entity had to get rid of regarding 33 million dollars of its reserves to supply the demand. So far in March, the balance of his intervention is positive at regarding 530 million dollars.
* The BCRA board is studying raising the reference rate by between 1.5 and 2 percentage points in the short term to adjust yields to high inflation, a source with direct knowledge of the matter told Archyde.com on Thursday.
* The peso in the informal exchange market remained stable at 202 per dollar, and in the alternative segments it did so at 196.5 units in the “counted with settlement” stock market (CCL) and at 196.2 in the so-called “MEP dollar”. “.
(Reporting by Walter Bianchi; Editing by Jorge Otaola)
