The following is an instructive of the steps to follow in the labyrinth set up by the Argentine bureaucracy to have access to a limited amount of US dollars. The instructive should help clear some of the latest measures implemented by the administration of President Cristina Kirchner and was published on Tuesday by The Buenos Aires Herald and Ambito Financiero.
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.
Argentine Senator and former cabinet chief Anibal Fernandez strongly defended on Monday restrictions imposed by the government on dollar purchases arguing it would be “suicidal” to return to a flexible scheme which he insisted was implemented in defence of “the interests of Argentina”.
The current strict measures to counter the purchase of US dollars and by extension capital flight, implemented by Argentina apparently have a calendar date full of political significance: August 3 when the Boden 2012 fully matures.
Argentina announced on Thursday the use of a new computer tool to gather information from buyers of holiday packages from travel agencies, in another attempt to control savers thirst for greenbacks after the government's crackdown on access to dollars.
Wednesday was another day of intense trading for the money exchange market in Buenos Aires with the “blue” or black market dollar reaching a new record, 6.15 Argentine Pesos, which for the first time was higher than the system used for getting dollars out of the country.
For the second day running the Argentine Peso weakened against the US dollar climbing half a cent from Monday and closing at 4.43 and 4.48 on the local foreign exchange market.
A former Argentine central bank president warned that if the economy follows on the current course, a “de facto devaluation” is round the corner because of the growing gap between the official and parallel exchange rates for the US dollar.
After a day of intense trading in the ‘blue’ (informal) market for US dollars which reached a new high of 5.50 Pesos, Argentine President Cristina Fernández assured on Tuesday evening that there will be no economic ‘shocks’ or a ‘system of multiple exchange rates’ as “has been rumoured during the whole day”.
The US dollar in Argentina’s parallel market soared on Tuesday as strong unsatisfied demand moved to the so called ‘blue’ market as a result of the increasing controls for the purchase of the greenback.