Alberto returned from Mexico with a surprise for Héctor Magnetto

While vaccines and economic recovery are the two strongest cards the government has for success in 2021, President Alberto Fernández arrives at the opening of the political year, with his address to the Legislative Assembly, with a handful of good news to give. This week ends with the arrival of two million doses, more than all previous accumulated shipments, which will finally allow the massive inoculation operation to escalate. In addition, By March, no less than five million per month are expected to arrive for the rest of the year, allowing the entire population over 18 to be vaccinated without much delay..

Escape to Argentina: the rich speedboat

At the same time, the closing of the national education parity to nearly 35%, with two cases of revision in the second semester, as well as the announcement of the two bonds that will help the seventy percent of retirees who earn the least to overcome inflation this quarter in the foreground the government’s desire that the economic recovery quickly reach the pockets of the most neglected Argentines, as a condition, on an equal footing with the macroeconomic balance, to manage the way out of the crisis. These two questions will be the main axes of the message that Fernández will deliver tomorrow at noon to the Congress, without popular mobilization due to a political decision due to the increase in the cases registered these days.

Guzman to the rescue

In government, they are convinced that the economic equation will be resolved in the coming months and that the electoral campaign will be achieved with tangible results in the pockets of Argentines. In this direction, recent announcements on parities and pensions add to income tax changes to mark that the State intends to lead the recovery of the purchasing power of the popular classes but also of the middle sectors. Of course, without support, whether good or bad, from the private sector, good intentions will fall on deaf ears. Provisional price increase figures for February indicate the end is still open.

Martín Guzmán’s team, meanwhile, puts all its chips in the macro. In this sense, the consolidation of the external front stands out. Since December, the BCRA has accumulated three months of increased reserves, which have increased by $ 1.2 billion. In addition, the exchange rate differential was reduced by 70 percentage points. Part of this is because dollars are entering the local financial system through the cash settlement tool, which marks a dramatic change in expectations from last spring. It allowed Last week, measures will be taken to ease restrictions on access to the dollar for importers, the “stocks” that most concern the economic cabinet.

This reduction also makes it possible to face the negotiations with the International Monetary Fund differently. This week, The team of President Fernández and Guzmán has ratified that there is no time limit to seek the agreement, even if it extends beyond the month of May. This same slack allowed Guzmán spoke to the G20 of the need to review the surcharges charged by the IMF to countries that have contracted “extraordinary” obligations, like those that Argentina took under the government of Mauricio Macri. Other recent news, about the fund’s self-critical review of the loan granted to Macri, also reflects the new conditions of this dialogue.

When I can I’ll give you a bovine

With the arrival of the two Aerolineas Argentinas planes which, reading this note, cross the sky reaching Buenos Aires and Moscow, The country will more than double its vaccine stockpile in a matter of days, a sign that the political and logistical bottlenecks that made it difficult to get supplies to nearly every country in the world in the first two months of the year are being left for. account., at least for us. It is not a detail that The nearly four million doses already present in the country have three different origins: the Russian of Sputnik, the Chinese of Sinopharm and the Anglo-Indian of Covishield. Few countries have obtained three different contracts and this explains the success of the official strategy.

The presidential adviser in charge of negotiations with Russia, Cecilia Nicolini, brings two excellent news from her last trip to Moscow. The first is the manufacturing agreement for Sputnik in Argentina, which will include the installation of a laboratory in Richmond in the province of Buenos Aires. The process will take at least two years, but it will leave the country in a much better position in the event of future epidemics or pandemics. The second news is the commitment that in March the supply of vaccines will be regularized at a rate of one million per week. Another 580 thousand doses of Covishield will also arrive that month and the purchase of three million additional doses has been agreed with Sinopharm..

From his trip to Mexico, Fernández returned with one certainty: the logistical issues that created a bottleneck in Mexico to complete the joint manufacturing process of the Oxford AstraZeneca vaccine have already been left behind and the first batch will be ready in early April, which by political decision of the two governments and private investors Carlos Slim and Hugo Sigman, will be distributed proportionally among all Latin American countries except Brazil, which does not participate in this agreement. As he was able to discover from El Uncover, Of the 22 million doses committed in the country, in the first days of this month, more than four million will be available.

El Slim factor

From Aztec lands, the Argentine president brought another booty, from the conversation he had with Carlos Slim, the richest man in Latin America, who left this meeting talking about the wonders of his interlocutors. In addition to talking about the immunization program, for which he made the indispensable initial investment, the president of Telmex, which operates in the region under the name of Claro, left satisfied with the explanations that Minister Guzmán gave him concerning the regulation of the telecommunications market and instead of criticizing price controls, he praised the fact that steps had been taken “to ensure that everyone has access to what the digital age is”.

However, two other news items that were discussed at this meeting have passed under the radar. On the one hand, the businessman’s intention to land in public infrastructure works in Argentina, through the Carso group. This explains the presence of Carlos Jarque, the executive of Carso, in the first of the meetings between Fernández and his economic team with Mexican businessmen, replacing Slim’s son, Carlos Slim Domit, more closely linked to Telmex. Without details, a compromise was found for the conglomerate to start participating in tenders for major infrastructure works that the government is preparing for the coming months and which are at the heart of the reactivation plan.

Finally, Fernández and Slim agreed that Claro would make the necessary investments to deliver the so-called triple play: In addition to mobile telephone services, in which it already occupies nearly a third of the market, it will begin to compete with itself by offering Internet and satellite television. The political ramifications of this compromise can be explosive. The president has repeatedly said that the Clarín problem is not solved with another media law but with the law for the defense of competition, but so far no one could compete with the group led by Héctor Magnetto. Slim may be the only player on the continent who has the clout to take the place. Bring some popcorn.