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For the dollar, Alberto Fernández sends Guzmán to the center of the ring

2020-10-16T02:48:59.717Z


The package would already be prepared. We are going to do the opposite of what has been done so far, said the Minister of Economy. IMF emissaries were the first to learn of this political shift.


10/15/2020 11:18 PM

  • Clarín.com

  • Opinion

Updated 10/15/2020 11:18 PM

The Ministry of Economy will

announce new measures

to try to control a financial dollar that on Thursday touched 172 pesos.

Martín Guzmán decided to turn everything around: there would be provisions that

will change the restrictions

that the BCRA implemented on the “Contado con Liqui” market.

The package would already be prepared and on Thursday the Central Bank discussed it in

a heated board meeting.

The provisions that Guzmán exclusively generated imply

undoing the path

that Miguel Pesce himself set out a few months ago.

The BCRA and the Securities Commission made decisions to restrict and control all operations in the financial market for companies.

Now Guzmán - with the support of Alberto Fernández - is

going to make controls more flexible

and will promote the expansion of operations between private parties in the Cash With Liqui.

The issue was discussed in a meeting - alone - between the President and the minister.

Guzmán stated: "

We are going to do the opposite of what has been done

until now."

Miguel Pesce was notified of the initiative.

In short, it is about reviewing decisions that the BCRA adopted when the run began and the ticket barely exceeded 100 pesos.

They failed.

Minister Martín Guzmán: "We are going to do the opposite of what has been done."

Pesce resisted at first.

Guzmán's proposals - without drama -

imply harsh criticism and disavowal

of what the BCRA had been doing.

The head of the monetary authority twisted Guzmán's arm when he announced the superpower in mid-September.

The minister was paying: two days before he declared that it was not going to be implemented.

Now,

the "round" is won by Guzmán

.

Pesce first objected, but kicked little.

He knows about a secret political decision that Alberto - his friend - made and that gave him no chance.

It happened about 13 days ago.

In the midst of the convulsions, the internal fights and the exchange run.

It was the first Saturday in October and at the Quinta de Olivos.

At that meeting,

the President awarded in favor of Minister Guzmán

.

But his decision was not only on technical measures and the

neighborhood fights

that involve the economic team.

The President stopped the shouting.

He looked at the ministers and said categorically: "From now on,

Martín has the last word on everything

."

There was surprise.

The duo Pesce and Guzmán heard it.

Santiago Cafiero, Matías Kulfas, Cecilia Todesca and Mercedes Marcó del Pont were also witnesses.

Alberto continued: he said that Guzmán was also going to be responsible for coordinating monetary and exchange policy.

The Fund's emissaries

were the first to learn

of this political shift.

Luis Cubeddu of the IMF was explicit in Washington.

The bureaucrat transmitted what he had heard from Guzmán: "Now everything happens for me."

Pesce is not going to quit.

The head of the BCRA accepted the new reality.

Guzmán is not going to place a figure on his team to control the BCRA.

But - somehow - Pesce will have to report to him and hold him accountable.

Pesce communicated his position to the BCRA team: he said that he would only resign if they asked him to devalue.

"I," he said, "am not going to devalue."

Guzmán's empowerment is

similar to what Mauricio Macri did with Nicolás Dujovne

.

Alberto made the same mistake as the former president: splitting and dividing the economic decision.

Exactly the reverse of what a deep crisis requires: the tsunami has already arrived and many do not realize it.

Macri and the President put on a poor show this week.

Both competed blaming each other for the crisis.

The two - Macri and Fernández -

avoided talking about their own mistakes

and neither did it occur to them to say how Argentina can get off the slide of decadence.

The last straw came with another discussion: they competed in counting which of the two governments lost fewer reserves.

The strong outflow of dollars was precisely what made Macri's economy explode.

Alberto's lethal foreign exchange run has to do with a dollar flight that the new government failed to stop.

Reserves and bills of the trade balance disappear.

The Minister of Economy, Martín Guzmán, also received the support of Cristina Kirchner.

Photo: EFE / Juan Mabromata / POOL

Cristina - another figure responsible for the serious problems - supported the decision to empower Guzmán.

He has a fluent dialogue with the minister and Joseph Stiglitz is an influential sponsor at Instituto Patria.

The Vice President agrees with the IMF.

Kristalina Georgieva wants a single negotiator from Argentina and they are comfortable with Guzman.

The minister explained, this week, at the Casa Rosada, the harsh statements of the head of the IMF.

He claimed that Kristalina is "softening" intransigent IMF directors.

But

his statements were not very happy

: he spoke of the exchange rate disparity and many interpreted that the IMF could ask for a devaluation of the peso.

The Fund bureaucrats have - it is usual - a double standard.

It would be naive for your officials to believe in the good vibes of economists.

Christine Lagarde was in love with Macri and that's how we ended.

The director of the IMF, Kristalina Georgieva, said that the organization will not ask for more adjustment to Argentina.

Photo: NICHOLAS KAMM / AFP

Georgieva said the IMF mission did not come to ask for further adjustment.

Julie Kozak and Cubeddu said in Buenos Aires that Argentina

should increase the tax burden

"at least 2%."

It was in the meetings they had with the private economists.

Daniel Marx, Martín Redrado and Carlos Melconian warned that the private sector is exhausted.

That opinion was circulated at the IDEA Colloquium.

Alberto Fernández broke with the sectarian Kirchner attitude: unlike Néstor and Cristina, he agreed to go and open the important meeting.

The reception was cold and did not convince IDEA.

Some businessmen had the bad taste of using an internal chat and before the end of their speech, insistently objected to the President.

The speech of Roberto Alexander, the head of the Colloquium, also generated controversy.

For his followers, it was a masterpiece, but for others he used ambiguous and confusing phrases without any proposal.

The greater power to Guzmán

orders the internal fight

.

The minister spoke about the issue on Wednesday at a reserved lunch with Pedro's Wado and Sergio Massa.

They both said they're going to shore it up.

But the question does not solve the underlying problem:

the lack of credibility in the Casa Rosada and the doubts generated by the interference of Cristina's obsolete ideas.

Since the Vice President appeared in June, Alberto has not stopped falling in the polls and mistrust has taken hold of the economic world.

The other problem –objective– is the non-existent reserves: the dripping never stopped.

The IMF would have obtained that data.

The “net” reserves - not all usable - would add up to $ 6 billion.

Instead, the "liquid reserves"

would be only 200 million greenbacks

.

But the BCRA would have found a device: to increase the money available with SEDESA's placements in dollars.

The Deposit Insurance has placed 2,000 million dollars in the BCRA.

They are funds in dollars, but that the BCRA can return in pesos.

And therefore, you could use them in an emergency.

This is another patch for emergency.

Alberto spoke with Roberto Lavagna.

It was a week ago in Olivos.

The President was clear: the Casa Rosada only wants to buy time while waiting for the agreement with the IMF.

An unambitious strategy to face a “perfect storm”.

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Source: clarin

All news articles on 2020-10-16

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