© Archyde.com/AGUSTIN MARCARIAN
Men walk in front of the headquarters of the Banco de la Nación Argentina, in the financial center of Buenos Aires
BUENOS AIRES, March 4 (Archyde.com) – Argentine sovereign bonds sank on Friday, amid marked global risk aversion, despite the announcement that the country had reached an agreement with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) to restructure some 45,000 million dollars, which removes the pressure on the next maturities.
The agreement reached with the international credit organization should be discussed in the Argentine Congress for approval next week, amid discrepancies within the officialdom, and then be transferred to the IMF board.
“The new agreement, while necessary, is not enough for Argentina to grow once more. The structural obstacles to economic growth go beyond the short-term financial, they have to do with the lack of profitability and clear rules of the game and stable,” said Eugenio Marí of the Fundación Libertad y Progreso.
The new agreement establishes that the payment period for each disbursement is 10 years, with a grace period of four and a half years, so the country will begin to pay the debt in 2026 and end in 2034.
“Our government is not adding a single dollar of debt. What we are doing is refinancing those maturities, gaining time,” Economy Minister Martín Guzmán said in radio statements.
* The Argentine country risk prepared by the bank JP.Morgan soared 68 basis points, to 1,928 units at 1:15 p.m. local time (1615 GMT), approaching its historical maximum of 1,969 units noted at the end of January.
* Sovereign bonds in the OTC segment lost a strong 1.8% on average, led by more liquid dollarized issues. The benchmark bond Bonar 2030 fell 2.6%.
* Fears regarding the future of the domestic economy are added to a strong aversion to risk as a result of the Russian invasion of Ukraine that creates doubts regarding the near future of the world economy.
* “The market continues to be attentive to geopolitical tensions, in view of which local assets accompany external caution while possible differences in the closing of the agreement with the IMF are monitored,” commented Gustavo Ber, an economist at Estudio Ber.
* In the stock market, the leading benchmark S&P Merval lost 2.60%, to 89,177.38 points, where declines of more than 4% stood out in energy and financial stocks of firm negotiation.
* Argentina’s state-controlled oil company YPF said its profit fell 54.2% year-on-year in the fourth quarter to $247 million.
* The interbank peso lost 0.12%, to 108.16/108.17 per dollar, in a place regulated by the central bank (BCRA) with purchases or sales of foreign currency from its reduced reserves.
* Guzmán said that following the disbursements from the IMF and the payments to the organism, the reserves of the BCRA will rise by some 6,000 million dollars.
* The peso in the informal exchange rate recovered 1.49%, to 201 per unit in a reduced market, while in the alternative segments the stock market “counted with liquidation” (CCL) was traded at 201 per dollar and in the defendant “MEP dollar” did so at 197.1 per unit.
(Reporting by Walter Bianchi; With the collaboration of Hernán Nessi; Editing by Jorge Otaola)
