Massa is already in Washington to meet the IMF, look for investments and loans

Serge Massa he landed in Washington on Monday to make his debut in Washington as the economy minister a high profile tour in the midst of an economic and political crisis in Argentina that sees him as a storm pilot. Your first activity, Tuesday morning, It will be at the State Department.

It is the first trip abroad for Massa, which will be in the US for a week with the purpose of negotiate with the International Monetary Fund, unlock credits and seek investments in a climate of anticipation for his arrival in government and also of concern for the economic future and political violence that reigns in our country, crystallized in the attempted murder of vice president Cristina Fernández de Kirchner.

Massa arrived on the occasion of Labor Day in the United States accompanied by the Minister of Tourism, Matías Lammens; his spokesman, Santiago García Vázquez, and his international adviser, Gustavo Martínez Pandiani. He was received by Ambassador Jorge Argüello.

The first activity of Massa it will be in the morning with a visit to the State Department where he will be received by Ricardo Zuñiga, a Western Hemisphere official. It is a “rigorous” visit, but the minister is seen as a figure of political interest in Washington, beyond his current position in the economic portfolio.

It is to be expected that the issue of political tensions will emerge there and certainly the attack on Vice President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner, which has caused concern in Joe Biden’s government. Secretary of State Anthony Blinken condemned the attack “strongly”. as he knew Clarione, Massa will thank the State Department for its “swift and decisive action”.

Massa’s mission actually started this Monday becauseand the technical officers had already landed in Washington on Sunday of the Economy which immediately began to collaborate with the IMF, even though it was a non-working day.

Masa and his team will examine the achievement of the objectives of the program and proceed with the disbursement of 4,000 million US dollars in September, presenting the economic measures that have been adopted in these days to achieve the fiscal objectives of the program and add reserves, at a time when the coffers are in the red.

Experts don’t expect major problems with this revision, but Massa may be trying to “recalibrate” some goals because year-end reviews seem difficult to achieve. Everything will be sealed when Massa comes face to face with Kristalina Georgieva next Monday.

They were working at the embassy Leonardo Madcur (head of councilors); Raul Rigo (The tax authorities); Gabriel Rubinstein (Political Economics); Edward Setyou (Finance), Lisandro Cleri (Central Bank) e Marco Lavagna (Indec) with the IMF team led by Luis Cubeddu and with the representative of the agency in Argentina, Ben Kelmanson.

“I think in the Fund they feel that they can work better with this team than with Martín Guzmán’s.”said to Clarione Hector Torres, former representative of Argentina before the organization. He explains that “Massa has made announcements that try to show a willingness to correct fiscal imbalances. He also has more political support than its predecessors. Both things help. “

However, the expert points out the context of this delicate mission: “This bringing the entire economic team to Washington instead of the personnel coming to Buenos Aires is quite exceptional because it is normally the IMF team that goes to the capital for the reviews of the program. And he pointed out that this move “It is justified by the rarefied political environmentthat the attempted murder of vice president Cristina Kirchner led to paroxysm ”.

From the environment of Massa they indicated that Argentine officials will be placed in specific meetings, in which their participation is necessary. Indeed, this Tuesday afternoon there is an event at the Argentine tourism promotion embassy and that is why Minister Lammens came.

These days there will also be meetings at the United States Chamber of Commerce as well with representatives of US companies that invest in hydrocarbons, food, logistics and mining.

Massa will also meet with the Treasury authorities (the maximum would be a meeting with Secretary Janet Yellen, but it is possible that he will meet David Lipton) and also with Joe Biden’s advisor for Latin America, Giovanni Gonzalez, with whom he cultivates a good personal relationship.

Massa and his technicians are also trying to unlock $ 2,000 million in disbursements and a credit (REPO) for an additional $ 2,000 million to buy back debt and strengthen reserves. With this goal in mind, Massa will meet with the president of the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB), Mauricio Claver Carone, and the CEO of the World Bank, Axel van Trotsenburg.

With Claver Carone, the minister will also try to reconstruct complicated relations from the candidacy of Gustavo Béliz to the position that the Cuban-American ended up occupying. Claver also froze an outlay of $ 800 million for Argentina and is estimated to have done so because he suspected that the government in which he was accused of having an affair with a colleague and of corruption .two facts for which he is investigated.

In the midst of his visit to Washington, Massa will travel to Houston on Friday where you will have meetings with representatives of oil companies such as Chevron, Exxon, Total, British Oil, among others. The minister’s idea is to present Argentina as a country full of investment opportunities in the energy sector. He will then return to Washington for the last and most important appointment of his tour on Monday 12th. At the end of that day he will return to Buenos Aires.