MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Argentines will have “to change their mentality and start thinking in Pesos”

Senator Anibal Fernandez: “we don’t have a green-making machine.”

Argentine Senator Aníbal Fernández and Interior Minister Florencio Randazzo came on stage in defence of the new restrictions placed on the purchase of dollars by assuring “they are there to preserve the value of the currency,” and that further actions might be taken.

The Senator and former Cabinet Chief tackled down all comments against the government’s new restrictions on dollar purchases. “Argentines will have to start thinking in pesos,” he stated.

Likewise, Fernández reminded that “only 11% of the Argentines have their savings in dollars, the rest have nothing to do with the issue; measures must be for all Argentines” and added, “We don’t have a green-making machine.”

“The dollar is issued in the US, not in Argentina”, recalled the Senator emphasizing “nobody wants to make life miserable for people with the measures”.

“But people will have to change their mentality. This is a typical deformation of Argentines who makes us think how the exchange money policy is going to affect us, and then jumps into the dollar”.

The former cabinet minister said that the truth is “some people are sowing the idea that Argentina must collapse”, and pointed to several media. “They want to hurt government by saying that the dollar policy is going to sink the vessel, but I can assure they shouldn’t imagine or think that is going to happen”.

“It’s the same old story, a prophecy comes true: they sponsor the worst of conditions so that devaluation follows and then they reap the profits, we know the script and those who promote it”, insisted Fernandez.

The former Cabinet Chief said the government needs to accumulate international reserves with the trade surplus to satisfy imports and address foreign commitments, and insisted Argentines must change their hoarding dollars mentality.

“We don’t live with the US dollar, we live with Argentine Pesos” indicated the former cabinet chief pointing out that “in Brazil the physical number of dollars per capital is six while in Argentina it is 1.300 dollars”.

Meanwhile, the Interior Minister assured that the government “is not worried about the parallel dollar price.”

“Those speculating over the measures are not going to be able to destroy the efforts made by the Argentine people in recent years and the fact that the economy has achieved sustained growth,” stated the minister while leading a Road Safety event in the Buenos Aires Province

“The measures implemented are to defend the value of the Argentine currency and the pockets of the Argentines”, said Randazzo who as Fernandez indicated it would be “a significant cultural advance that the Argentine economy reference is the Peso”.

Meanwhile the “blue” or parallel dollar ended trading on Tuesday at 5.91 Pesos which is a couple of cents above Monday. The official exchange rate for the dollar remained at 4.49 Pesos for the very limited and monitored operations officially allowed. The Euro dropped two cents to 5.57 and 5.72 Pesos.

The Argentine central bank ended the day with a surplus purchase of 40 million dollars said money traders in the Buenos Aires City.