The International Monetary Fund on Tuesday said it had reached a staff-level agreement with Argentina on the third review of the country\u2019s bailout, potentially unlocking about $900 million for the Latin American country.\n<\/p>\n
The agreement is subject to approval by the IMF\u2019s Executive Board, after which the tranche can be disbursed to the Argentinian government.\n<\/p>\n
In 2025, as it dealt with rampant inflation and currency depreciation, Argentina concluded an extended fund facility agreement with the IMF worth around $20 billion over four years.\n<\/p>\n
Since then, President Javier Milei has instituted a wide-ranging reform plan involving slashing public spending and reining in inflation.<\/p>\n
The social spending cuts instituted by his government \u2014 with the IMF\u2019s approval \u2014 have been deeply unpopular, prompting frequent protests.\n<\/p>\n
Since Milei took office in December 2023, inflation has dropped from triple digits to the current 33.5 percent.<\/p>\n
In a statement on Tuesday, the IMF said Milei\u2019s reform program had delivered \u201cimpressive results.\u201d<\/p>\n
It lauded a marked improvement in the country\u2019s fiscal buffers and foreign exchange reserves.\n<\/p>\n
It also praised the structural reforms instituted by the government \u201cin the areas of trade, labor, investment and capital markets,\u201d saying they were \u201cenabling a more efficient and market-based economy.\u201d\n<\/p>\n
Part of the agreement for the release of the latest tranche of the bailout involved pledges from the Argentinian government to deliver further promises on both fiscal and monetary policy. <\/p>\n
On the fiscal side, the IMF said Argentina had committed to delivering a primary surplus of 1.4 percent of GDP this year and next.\n<\/p>\n
In terms of monetary policy, the central bank would take actions to support disinflation and reserve accumulation, while allowing exchange rate flexibility within a band, the IMF said.\n<\/p>\n
On the reform agenda, the IMF said priority would be given to deepening domestic capital markets and expanding access to longer-term financing, among other steps.\n<\/p>\n
Argentina is the IMF\u2019s largest debtor and has $1.2 billion in debts to the Fund due this year, with a further $7.8 billion due next year.<\/p>\n
While Milei\u2019s government has succeeded in reining in runaway inflation, economic performance has been lacking in other key areas.\n<\/p>\n
Consumer activity is anemic while debt defaults are skyrocketing.\n<\/p>\n
Mortgage defaults have tripled over the past year, hitting 12.8 percent, the highest level in 20 years.\n<\/p>\n
Growth remains sluggish and earlier this month the IMF downgraded its forecast for GDP expansion to 2.1 percent in 2026.\n<\/p>\n
AFP\n <\/p>\n
Source: <\/p>\n
The International Monetary Fund on Tuesday said it had reached a staff-level agreement with Argentina on the third review of the country\u2019s bailout, potentially unlocking about $900 million for the… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2003","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/globalnigerianews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2003","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/globalnigerianews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/globalnigerianews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globalnigerianews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globalnigerianews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2003"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/globalnigerianews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2003\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/globalnigerianews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2003"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globalnigerianews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2003"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globalnigerianews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2003"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}