IMF faces its first meeting with Milei with the goal of bringing “stability” to Argentina

The International Monetary Fund (IMF) faces the first in-person meeting with the Government of the President of Argentina, Javier Milei, with the goal of supporting ongoing efforts to “restore macroeconomic stability“, official sources from the financial organization told EFE.

These sources confirmed that an IMF delegation will travel to Argentina tomorrow, Thursday with the aim of renegotiating the agreement for a total debt that amounts to about US$46 billion, as Argentina’s presidential spokesman, Manuel Adorni, had announced yesterday Tuesday.

The IMF delegation will be led by the deputy director of the Fund’s department in charge of Latin America, Luis Cubeddu, and by the head of the Argentine mission, Ashvin Ahuja, the aforementioned sources detailed.

These representatives of the Fund will be received by Nicolás Posse, Milei’s chief of staff, and the Minister of Economy, Luis Caputo, in what will be the first in-person meeting between both parties since the Argentine president took office on December 10.

A team close to Milei already met with IMF representatives when he traveled to Washington on November 28 after his election as president, during the transition period. However, the leader of La Libertad Avanza did not participate in this meeting.

It is expected that the objective of the Argentine Government in this week’s meeting will be to postpone the first maturities of this year, which are due on January 9 and amount to US$ 1.3 billion, and on the 16th of this month, for US $650 million more.

One of the measures, already planned by the international organization, is for Argentina to unify payments, this is only possible if there is more than one maturity in the same period, something that was done in June, July and October of last year, during the Government of Alberto Fernández (2019-2023).

In the middle of the December transition, President Milei had to resort to a short-term loan from the CAF Development Bank of Latin America for US$960 million to pay the December 21 maturities.

For now, the IMF has supported the measures aimed at fiscal adjustment, cutting public spending and stopping monetary issuance that the new Argentine Government seeks to implement since the arrival of Milei.