The calmness of exchange rates in recent days starts to break while the idea is gaining ground on the market that the government will not be able to continue to support the strategy of correcting the official price by only 2% per month. With inflation exceeding 20% per month, this is the perception of investors there will be a new jump in the exchange rate in the next months. And they try to anticipate the move.
In this climate, the blue dollar rose $50 and touched the level on Tuesday $1,180. With this the exchange rate gap rises to 44%. “New day with an acceleration of exchange rates in the market. The gaps are already close to 50%. “This continues to put pressure on the excessively low official depreciation rate of 2% per month,” they underlined from Aurum Valores.
Therefore, the informal closed very close to the record of $1,200 which took place before the presidential elections of 22 October, in the midst of the operations with which the then minister and candidate Sergio Massa tried to paralyze informal sales.
The upward pressure also reached liquidity, with the liquid, the dollar used by companies, rising by 4.2%. $1,213 on sale. For its part, the MEP dollar rose by 3.6% and was sold at $1,165.
So far, in 2024, The CCL rose 25% and the official dollar moved only 1.2%. This is a reflection of the mood of the market, which, although betting that Javier Milei’s plan will work, doubts the possibility of maintaining the exchange rate peg as tight as Minister Luis Caputo promises.
“The market does not believe that the Central Bank can support the 2% monthly devaluation rate beyond the honesty of relative prices, which would happen in February with the first increases in energy rates”, underline from Portfolio Personal Inversions (PPI) .
If he creeping peg, the exchange rate adjustment would remain at 2% monthly, the wholesale dollar is at today $818 January should end in $825, February in $841 and march inside $858. According to future dollar prices shown by Rofex, the market sees the official exchange rate as $955 for March.
“The spread between the future and the “theoretical” exchange rate with a 2% monthly devaluation rate increases significantly starting in April, with the future being 17.4% lower than the theoretical official value of $875 in April and 23% lower than $893 in April. would be worth it in May,” the PPI says.
In the midst of this recovery, the positive news is this The Central Bank’s buying streak remains unbeaten despite the fact that importers’ access to the official dollar began to expand this week. With this Santiago Bausili’s team records 25 wheels in a row with a favorable balance.
This Tuesday he bagged 217 million dollars and so it was 1,734 million dollars in the month e 4,596 million dollars from the December devaluation.
However, this cushion could begin to weaken as demand for foreign currency from importers grows.
For the economist Gustavo Ber, “from the exchange rate front, The focus is on the return of importers to the market which could reduce the purchase balance of the BCRA, especially when there would also be less interest from exporters due to deteriorating competitiveness.”
As the gap widens, exporters have less incentive to liquidate their dollars and even less expectation that the exchange rate will rise again.
“The gap continues to take center stage, since once the expansion ends – beyond the temporary benefits on the BOPREAL, the bonus for importers – A future devaluation could take place before the heavy harvest to encourage liquidations again.“.
Source: Clarin
