A thousand Argentine peso bill sits on top of several US one hundred dollar bills in this illustrative image. October 17, 2022. REUTERS/Agustin Marcarian/Illustration

A classic at the beginning of the month, when savers see their quota renewed to access the purchase of up to 200 USD at the so-called “solidarity dollar” or “savings dollar” exchange rate – which closed today at 336 dollars – This It’s been four months since the modality started to lose intensity. This is reflected in Central Bank statistics, according to which the number of purchases fell by 25% and, in strict correlation, the volume operated.

As detailed in the monetary authority’s latest report Foreign Exchange Market Developments and Foreign Exchange Balance, in January “human people” operated bills for $142 million, with purchases for $139 million and sales for $3 million. The figure is 9% higher than December but represents a decrease of $45 million from last year, when in the first month of the year 1 million people purchased for 184 millions of dollars. This year, of the number of people who operated, 727,000 people bought tickets, while some 19,000 sold, resulting in per capita purchases and sales of $196 and $177, respectively.

The drop in purchases in the year-on-year comparison of dollar bills for hoarding is a recorded trend since october last yearcoinciding not only with the greater financial calm that set in after the gale that broke out in July, but also with the requirement imposed in the tariff segmentation plan that in order to maintain the subsidy in gas, water and electricity service, users are prohibited from buying savings dollars. This requirement began to be operational precisely from October last year and, although almost half a million users who had registered in the register to preserve the subsidy finally preferred the cancellation to be able to access the currency at a special price, the official figures clearly reflect the impact of the cross-restriction.

On a net basis, the Central Bank report said, “individuals” bought $551 million, mostly for spending with consumer cards from non-resident providers, with a net of $374 million.

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Overall, bank customers bought USD 802 million in the foreign exchange market, of which BCRA sold USD 417 million in the market and made net payments through the local currency payment system for USD 39 million, while the entities themselves sold $345 million.

In addition, National Treasury purchases were recorded directly from the BCRA for the equivalent of 967 million USD.

The “Non-Financial Private Sector” was a net buyer of currencies for 685 million dollars on the foreign exchange market. Within this group, the main sector in terms of net turnover, “Oilseeds and grains”, recorded a net income of 798 million USD, which is 69% less than in the same month of 2022. The sector has partially canceled the net indebtedness during the month of January that it had the previous month under the “Program for increasing exports”.

“It should be noted that the cancellation of this type of indebtedness does not imply an outflow of foreign exchange, but occurs when the export of previously financed goods materializes,” the report states. As for the rest of the sectors, i.e. the “real sector excluding oilseeds and cereals”, was a net buyer of foreign exchange for a total of 816 million dollars, which implied a reduction of 60% of one year to the next. Purchases were mainly used to make payments for imports of goods and services.

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