IMF CEO Kristalina Georgieva.
The new Minister of Economy, Silvina Batakis, assured the officials of the International Monetary Fund supporting Argentina’s program objectives with the agency, This was stated on Wednesday by the managing director of the IMF Kristalina Georgieva.
As reported by the agency Reuters, Batakis has already spoken with the head of the IMF’s Western Hemisphere Department, Brazilian Ilán Goldfajn, and has pledged to support the goals of the IMF’s $ 44 billion program, which Minister Martín Guzmán has negotiated to replace. the 2018 loan.
Georgieva said Reuters that the Fund will continue to support Argentina and that message will be conveyed to Batakis when he communicates later this Wednesday with the new official who replaced Guzmán.
“The world is indeed changing very rapidly, but she (for Batakis) is committed to achieving the goals of the program and is committed to working constructively with the Fund to achieve these goals,” said Georgieva.
He said Argentina faces a “very complex, very difficult moment”and that the IMF will do all it can to help the Argentine authorities cope with rising inflation.
batak “understands the purpose of fiscal discipline and he also understands that if you want to help the poor you can’t do it in conditions of rampant inflation, ”said Georgieva.
The change of minister is worrying in Washington and Wall Street, because Batakis is linked to the hard wing of Kirchnerism, which has criticized the agreement and fears that it will set aside the objectives set in the program, especially those relating to the adjustment of the fiscal deficit. monetary issuance and subsidy cuts.
Batakis, who held the position of Minister of Economy in the province of Buenos Aires and subsequently managed relations with the provinces, is not a well-known person on the international scene and in the United States his closeness to Vice President Cristina Kirchner and her more expansive spending policies.
However, the minister said so shortly after taking office he was engaged in tax restrictions. “I believe in fiscal balance and I think we need to move in that direction,” he said.
One of the main challenges for Batakis now is trying to regain the relationship with the Fund, which has remained exclusively in Guzmán’s orbit since Alberto Fernández took office. The program agreed in April passed its first overhaul weeks ago with some “creative accounting” from the government, but the second overhaul looks much more complicated given runaway inflation and expanding spending.
Experts such as Claudio Loser, who previously held Goldfajn’s position as IMF director for the Western Hemisphere, had told Clarín that he was an “unknown” to the Batakis Fund and that the organization was “desperately” to find out. what his profile was.
Furthermore, he warned that if the minister arrived “with a Kirchnerist program”, she could “face very serious problems”.
News in development
Paola Lugone
Source: Clarin
