Despite strong foreign currency purchases, the Central Bank International Reserves (BCRA) ended February with a balance of 26,690 million dollars, recording a decrease of 951 million dollars compared to the end of January, according to the BCRA Monetary Report published last Friday.
The Report explains that this loss was explained by “payments to international organizations. In particular, in February a payment was made to the IMF for 776.1 million dollars (expiry of interest under the Extended Facilities Agreement) and the CAF loan granted in December for “966.4 million dollars” .
Also contributing to the decrease in reserves were “the decrease in minimum cash accounts, with a particular impact on the last day of the month, which was reversed the following day, and to a lesser extent exchange differences. These effects were partially offset by the buying and selling of currencies on the free foreign exchange market (MLC) for approximately $2,360 million,” the Report adds.
Due to interest payments, in February there was a fiscal deficit, according to Congressional Budget Office (OPC) records, as reported by Clarín. In the first 2 months of this year, the interest payment was equivalent to what the National Administration paid in Family Asset and Liability Allocations, AUH, non-contributory pensions, transfers to PAMI, Empower Work, Food Policies, Scholarships Progresar, subsidies for energy and transport and transfers to universities.
On the other hand, private sector currency deposits They had a $454 million raise between the end-of-month sales and it closed February at $16,416 million. Meanwhile, loans to the private sector saw a decline of nearly $60 million, for a month-end balance of $3,772 million, the report said.
In relation to the real exchange rate, the Report indicates that “the BCRA has maintained the crawling peg of 2% monthly of the bilateral nominal exchange rate (TCN) against the US dollar, settling at $842.25/USD at the end of the month. At the end of the month, the multilateral real exchange rate index (ITCRM) was 8.3% higher than at the end of 2015 and 19% higher than the record 2016-17 average.”
For its part, the IMF announced that Argentina’s debt amounted to 32,450 million SDRs (Special Drawing Rights) as of February 29, equivalent to 43,160 million dollars. After interest payments to the IMF in February, the rest of the year another 1,890.48 million SDRs will have to be paid, equivalent to approximately 2.5 billion dollars.
Source: Clarin
