MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Argentina holds first meeting with Club of Paris

Minister Boudou is optimistic about an understanding

Argentina’s Economy Minister Amado Boudou met Friday with his French counterpart, Christine Lagarde, during the G-20 summit, in order to advance in the Club of Paris negotiations over Argentina's debt, one of the government's priorities.

This was the first bilateral meeting held between the two countries regarding the issue. Boudou presented Lagarde with a successive payment schedule which includes up to five year terms. Argentina’s has a pending debt not yet clearly established but in the range of 6.5 to 7 billion US dollars.

The Argentine government's idea is to re-negotiate the time periods determined for the debt and thus facilitate the access to the international markets on the part of businesses, in order to try and spur economic growth.

The Paris Club is a group of shareholding nations, made up by the United States, France, Holland, Germany, Japan and Spain, among other countries, which negotiate certain financial compromises within their businesses.

However, certain accomplishments have been hindered by the hike in Argentina’s Country Risk index, which increased 31 units to 795 basic points.

After arriving in Pittsburgh, Boudou said that Argentina was expecting a “new international financial structure” to come out of the international meeting.

“Our expectations have been renewed after the meeting in London. Surely many important topics of the new international financial structure will be discussed.”