Macri, the economy and Dutch disease: Argentinian angst

Euromoney Limited, Registered in England & Wales, Company number 15236090

4 Bouverie Street, London, EC4Y 8AX

Copyright © Euromoney Limited 2024

Accessibility | Terms of Use | Privacy Policy | Modern Slavery Statement

Macri, the economy and Dutch disease: Argentinian angst

I can’t seem to stop worrying about Argentina in its election year.

rd_banner_column-780



Ever since I first met with members of Cristina Kirchner’s administration – the henchmen that populated the state banks and ministries – I’ve been privately supporting the forces of their opposition.

That the ultimately successful opposition transpired to be a real breath of fresh air – Mauricio Macri’s Cambiemos – took me further out of my usually neutral position of observer.

Their victory – and the Macri administration’s attempts to dismantle the economic and financial mess they inherited – has verged on the heroic.

That’s not to say the finance ministers – and they’re getting through those by the way; Prat-Guy to Caputo to Dujovne – haven’t made some unforced errors and tightened the margin for error when there was barely any to begin with.

But the country – and it is potentially a great one – seemed to finally have a government it deserved.

Those mistakes, though, began to pile up and I began to worry.

Prescient call

In April, I wrote that – and it has been one of the few times in my career that I have made a prescient call – the tortuously slow fiscal adjustment would soon test the market’s patience.




Gift this article