MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Strong peso leading to outflow of dollars from Argentina

A convenient exchange rate drives Argentines to vacation abroad

Argentina is on track for a historic outflow of dollars due to surging outbound tourism, driven by a favorable exchange rate. Initial projections for this year have been significantly revised upward, with analysts now anticipating a total dollar outflow between US$11 billion and US$13 billion (around 1.6% of the country's GDP), which would outpace the US$10.662 billion recorded in 2017 under then-President Mauricio Macri.

The imbalance is starkly reflected in the traveler statistics. According to an analysis by Marcos Cohen Arazi of Ieral, Fundación Mediterránea, the balance of travelers registered a record deficit in the first nine months of the year.

“So far this year, 9.7 million Argentines have left the country, while 4.1 million tourists have entered, resulting in a deficit of 5.6 million travelers,” Cohen Arazi reported.

The resulting deficit in tourism spending is projected to close the year between US$7 billion and US$9 billion, with revenues from incoming tourists expected to be close to US$4 billion.

Recent data from the National Institute of Statistics and Census (Indec) showed that, in October, some 1.2 million Argentine residents traveled abroad, marking a 9.3% yoy increase. On the other hand, 679,200 non-resident visitors entered the country, representing a 10% interannual decline. The resulting tourism deficit for the month was 549,700 people.

Argentines spent US$597 million abroad, while foreign visitors left the country with just over US$232 million, resulting in a monthly deficit of approximately US$365 million.

The high volume of outbound travel is attributed to the relative appreciation of the peso, which makes international trips more affordable while simultaneously making domestic tourism more expensive.

Daniel Schteingart, Director of Sustainable Productive Development at Fundar, noted on his social media account that 2025 was “on track to be a historic record in outbound tourism,” predicting that the country will “very likely exceed 12 million tourists traveling abroad.” He added that inbound tourism is having “a very bad year, falling 17% compared to 2024... the worst year since 2006, except for the pandemic.”

The sector draws comparisons to the 1990s, when the “1-to-1” convertibility plan also fueled massive outflows of tourists, making foreign travel cheaper than domestic options.

Experts caution that the current demand for dollars from tourism is potentially “unsustainable,” concluding that a reversal of the trend is unlikely in the near future, given the current economic outlook.