The Central Bank seems determined to resolve this first part of the year “urgent” matters. related to Javier Milei’s economic program and leave for later any issues that are not related to the foreign exchange market and monetary policy. AS, banks and fintechs have managed – fairly – to “gain time” for discussion of the organization’s regulations that are at the heart of their old dispute.
Last Thursday the board of directors of the body chaired by Santiago Bausili was issued moved the deadlines for the entry into force of three key regulations for banks and virtual wallets. On the one hand, as traditional financial institutions ask, The deadline for the entry into force of the “fixed-term electronic certificate” has expired, a new feature for fixed terms that faces a lot of resistance in banks.
On the other hand, he also managed the start date of “pull transfers” and the interoperable payments with credit cards, a point quite contrasted by virtual wallets, with Mercado Pago in the lead. Now the three regulations will be suspended until April 30th.
First of all, the Central Bank decided postpone the entry into force of “electronic fixed term”a change to the form of saving preferred by Argentines who, among other things, returns to “transferable, redeemable and divisible” deposits.
The organization, then led by Alberto Miguel Pesce, had launched this new feature earlier in the year and the deadline to start offering it to its customers had already passed on two occasions.
The decision, reflected in Communication A 7943, comes at a time when the profitability of time deposits is in doubt: with the decline in key rates, A traditional fixed term gives a monthly interest of 9.1% against one inflation from which it is projected between 20% and 25% this month.
Secondly, through communication A 7942, the organization seems to wink at fintech companies having also decided to apply until next April 30th both incorporation of credit card payments into the interoperable QR, such as the entry into force of pull transfers, and the consequent Debin “blackout”, two measures much requested by banks and which had sparked a strong struggle in the last two months of 2023.
At the end of last November, Mercado Pago even filed a precautionary measure in court for the Central Bank to stop the implementation of these two new features for the world of payments.
Loudly, in fintech they have said twice this year, Technical Problems to allow their systems to communicate with the rest of the financial players when they pay with credit cards. And since August this year they have called for the postponement of this implementation “until at least April 2024”.
In a low voice, inside fintechs talk about “injustice”, since it was the company founded by Marcos Galperín that developed the systems and achieved the capillarity that today means that the majority of Argentines use it to pay for their consumption. And this is the argument with which the company tried to judicially stop this measure from the Central.
In one of the last board meetings of the organization before the change of government, it was decided to postpone the entry into force of both measures. But now the Central has actually carried it out again.
SN
Source: Clarin
