Economic keys of the week: new IMF mission, inflation and dollar

It should be noted that, as confirmed by the IMF, the Italian economist Roberto Cardarelli meet with the Minister of Finance, Nicolás Dujovne, the president of the central bank, Guido Sandleris and with economists and businessmen in the private sector, while meetings with opposition parties are not excluded.

The government has agreed with the IMF a 36-month program providing financial badistance of 56 billion US dollars until 2020, of which 28 million US dollars in Argentina already in Exchange of a plan of adjustment and balanced budget during this period. year

The mission is expected to confirm that the fiscal and monetary targets have been met over the past year, so the IMF Board approves the March payment of $ 11,000 million, the largest amount ever since the initial agreement announced in June of this year. past

Sources at the Central Bank announced that the IMF will badyze the new limits of the zone of non-intervention of exchange rate policy and the maximum monetization allowed for the purchase of dollars.

The government is awaiting the approval of the public accounts with confidence, the Ministry of Finance having reached the target of primary budget deficit of 2.4% of GDP the previous year, which represented a decrease of 1 , 4 point compared to the previous year. 3.8% compared to the previous year, in line with the target set at the IMF.

For its part, the Central Bank has broadly achieved the monetary base targets established with the agency, including last month, although it has released pesos on the market to buy $ 560 million the previous month.

January inflation

Thursday next National Institute of Statistics and Censuses (INDEC) publish the Consumer Price Index (CPI) for the first month of 2019, which, according to the consultants examined by this portal, will reach 2.85%.

It should be noted that inflation in December increased by 2.6% and closed the year 2018 with an increase of 47.6%, which is the highest figure since 1991, year when the cost of living had increased by 84%.

Dollar

The dollar jumped 61 cents last week to $ 38.92, its highest value since the beginning of the year, in the agencies and banks of the city of Buenos Aires, according to the average of domain.com, while Friday closed stable.

It was in line with the wholesale segment, where the currency grew by three cents and accumulated an increase of 68 cents a week. $ 37.85, in the middle of lower rates and central bank auctions.

In this way, market participants have speculated that the wholesale price could come back this week in the non-intervention zone, set by the BCRA between $ 38,155 and $ 49,377 for Monday.