Although no one in the government is publicly admitting the application of a new edition of the soybean dollar at this time, even Agriculture Secretary José Bahillo attributed the possibility to market “versions and speculations”. last week in dialogue with GlobeLiveMedia, the truth is that the expectation is more and more installed. This virtual certainty of financial and agricultural operators is based on the context of the loss of net reserves of the Central Bank since the beginning of the year, even though yesterday, for the first time in the month, the entity managed cut the streak of negative wheels and managed to rack up at least $3 million. The figure is symbolic of both the cumulative decline and the stock that analysts project towards the end of March, when according to the agreement with the IMF, it should total at least 7.5 billion dollars.
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In this context, it stands to reason that at some point in the year, sooner rather than later, the 3 soybean dollar will finally be announced. The timing is not a minor detail since the possible collection will depend on the date of Implementation. If applied in March, the private projections indicate the Central Bank could earn some $1.3 billion, about half of what the previous version racked up in December. The figure coincides with official estimates which indicate that there are still some 6 million tonnes of unsold grain, of which just over half could be liquidated, which would mean an income of around 2.5 billion dollars (which the BCRA would not accrue in full).
“The decline in net reserves so far this year exceeds $2.4 billion and the net reserve target for March is increasingly in jeopardy. The REPO loan that the Treasury would take out for about 1,000 million dollars would help the balance of the Central Bank. In addition, a new version of the soybean dollar could be implemented, which could bring in nearly $1.3 billion net,” financial consultant Delphos noted in its weekly report, where it warned that in l Absence of “creative measures” of these characteristics, Argentina is in the process of requesting a new “waiver” from the IMF, possibly justified by the few liquidations of the agro-export complex in recent months. “It wouldn’t be disruptive, but it would confirm that the net reserve targets are very demanding for the current situation, even with the reduction accepted by the IMF last year.”
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In the last revision of the 2022 targets, the Monetary Fund warned of drought risks and, although it suggested a “tightening” of fiscal and monetary policies to adapt economic variables to the context, it admitted a relaxation of targets which led to the USD 6,200 million to USD 5,500 million currency accumulation target against existing net reserves in December 2021.
But even with this lower requirement, the target seems highly unlikely to be met as it would mean the BCRA accumulating over $4 trillion next month. “Given that the minimal drought delayed the coarse harvest beyond April, expect March agriculture sales to be very similar to February (which is at historic lows Therefore, if there is no supply shock, we are headed for a significant breach of the IMF reserves target,” they agreed to PPI yesterday, where they forecast that ‘at the current rate of currency loss, the stock of net reserves could fall to 4,341 million USD at the end of February and 3,219 million USD at the end of March, which implies – they calculate – a deviation from the target of 4,622 million USD.
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“This would inevitably trigger a to renouncer by the Fund, which would not be the last of the programme. Therefore, it is to be expected that, not to achieve the target, which at this stage seems unlikely, but to reduce the magnitude of the gap, the government will announce next weekend a new dollar ” soy “which will allow it to temporarily accumulate reserves,” he said in his weekly outlook report.
According to the consultant’s estimates, producers have saved between 6 and 7 million tonnes compared to last season, which equates to a figure of between 3,400 and 4,000 million dollars. “The situation has deteriorated so much that the BCRA would not even reach the reserve target by buying all this surplus,” he warned.
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