BUDGET PREVIEWS 2027
The government last Tuesday evening sent its 2027 Budget Bill to Congress, thus complying with the statutory submission date of September 15. The initiative is to be debated at committee level as from October 7. The draft forecasts economic growth of four percent, annual inflation of 18 percent, an exchange rate of 1,847 pesos per dollar by the end of the year and a primary fiscal surplus of 1.3 percent of Gross Domestic Product with a final financial surplus of 0.2 percent or 3.3 trillion pesos. Exports are tipped to top US$130 billion with a trade surplus of over US$15 billion. Total public spending will be 216 trillion pesos, including 150.9 trillion pesos for social services and 7.3 trillion for universities, as against 219.3 trillion pesos in revenues. The government recognised that its 2026 Budget forecasts of 10 percent annual inflation and 5.4 percent economic growth would end the year well off target.
GROWTH FALLING FURTHER OFF
Argentina’s Gross Domestic Product grew two percent in the second quarter of this year as against the same period last but dipped 0.6 percent from the first quarter of this year, the INDEC national statistics bureau reported on Thursday, while the first half of this year registered 2.2 percent growth. Exports were up 2.5 percent for a year-on-year increase of 13.7 percent but private consumer spending and investment were down by 2.4 and 0.8 percent respectively. The main growth sectors were fisheries (44.7 percent), mining (16.4 percent) and agriculture (6.9 percent) but other sectors like industry and construction dragged the overall growth figure down.
WATERWORKS PRIVATISATION
The Economy Ministry announced last Tuesday that it had opened the envelopes in the tender to privatise the AySA waterworks. The consortia presenting their bids for evaluation are Rowing S.A. - Consorcio Rowing, Arcos, Transclor, PHX and Roggio Roas S.A.-Consorcio Roggio Roas S.A.U. The former consortium is spearheaded by Mauricio Filiberti, who virtually monopolises the chlorination of water in Argentina, and Brazil’s Arcos, which runs over half the waterworks in the giant neighbour, while Aldo Roggio, who owns the provincial waterworks in Córdoba and Corrientes, is a defendant and whistleblower in the Cuadernos (copybook) corruption trial. The privatisation covers the sale of the totality of state shares amounting to 90 percent while the remaining 10 percent will stay in the hands of the employees. Economy Minister Luis Caputo affirmed that the future operator would be obliged to invest over US$2 billion in the next five years while keeping billing constant in real terms. The contract further stipulates that 75.3 percent of the population be supplied with running water by 2031 and 63.9 percent with sewage, percentages rising to 90 and 75 percent, respectively, by the time the 30-year lease expires.
HOUSING SCAM ACQUITTALS
The TOC(Tribunal Oral Criminal)5 courtroom last Monday acquitted former Federal Planning Minister Julio De Vido in the 'Sueños Compartidos' ("Shared Dreams") case trying the misallocation of social housing funds while sentencing the Kirchnerite ex-officials José López and Abel Fatala and the Schoklender brothers Sergio and Pablo (both former trustees of the Madres de Plaza de Mayo Foundation) to short prison terms. López and Fatala, respectively Public Works secretary and undersecretary in Kirchnerite administrations, were both sentenced to 21 months, Sergio Schoklender to 20 months and Pablo Schoklender 16 months, the latter two sentences conditional. The prosecution had requested six years for De Vido and four years for the other defendants. An injunction was also slapped on 206,438,454.05 pesos of the assets of the convicted to compensate for the social housing funds entrusted to the Madres de Plaza de Mayo Foundation and misallocated between 2005 and 2011. The grounds of the sentence will be read out on November 13.
TRUMP DIXIT
United States President Donald Trump last weekend said that a conflict between Argentina and Britain over the Malvinas islands would be a “disaster” while assuring that if it came down to it, they should call him and he would be capable of sorting it out. The Malvinas are “very interesting” but Britain’s problems with immigration and energy would make them disinclined for such a distant conflict, Trump told journalists while on a visit to Dublin. It was Trump’s remark late last month about reconsidering US neutrality in the Malvinas dispute which triggered the current Argentine crackdown on unauthorised oil exploration with British licensing off the islands as from President Javier Milei’s September 3 nationwide broadcast. On Tuesday Britain’s Foreign Office issued a statement defying the sanctions imposed by the Milei administration and supporting the economic activities around the islands. The next day the Federal Court of Río Grande (Tierra del Fuego) ordered Britain’s Rockhopper Exploration and Israel’s Navitas Petroleum to halt their Sea Lion oil project north of the disputed islands.
BLACK HAWKS FLYING HERE
Just before last weekend United States Ambassador Peter Lamelas published on his X social network account that Argentina would be receiving four Black Hawk helicopters “to strengthen its defence and respond to emergencies … by arriving in time and saving lives,” following US Defense Department approval of a sale worth US$140 million. The helicopters would contribute to “frontier security operations, the battle against transnational crime, humanitarian assistance or response to disasters,” Lamelas added.
BEIJING SNUBBED
Argentina cancelled at the last minute its participation in the Xiangshan Forum on Security and Defence starting last Tuesday, vexing the event’s Chinese hosts. Over 100 countries attended the forum, including the United States sending a Pentagon official, but the Argentine presence was reduced to naval officer Adolfo Ureta, the defence attaché at its Beijing Embassy. Some analysts saw the no-show as a bid to ingratiate US President Donald Trump for his support in the Malvinas issue. China has also expressed annoyance with US Ambassador Peter Lamelas for remarks perceived as Sinophobic, accusing him of a “Cold War” outlook, as well as the recent remarks by Casa Rosada official Juan Pablo Carreira (aka 'Juan Doe') holding a Chinese hydro-electric dam responsible for the disaster in Nepal.
UNEMPLOYMENT INCHING UP
Unemployment climbed to 7.9 percent in the second quarter of this year, the INDEC national statistics bureau reported last Thursday, up by 0.3 percentage points from the same period last year and 0.1 points for the first quarter of this year. The data show the economically active to be 48.9 percent and the employed workforce to be 45 percent of the total population. Informal employment presented a statistically significant increase of one percentage point with respect to the same quarter last year while the percentage of the self-employed within the informal sector increased three percentage points from 34.3 to 37.3 percent.
SPRINGTIME IN PARIS
The controversial lawyer Santiago Muzio resigned last weekend as the director of the Casa Argentina in París, just ahead of President Javier Milei’s official visit to the French capital at the end of this month, and was replaced by Rosario legal scholar Alfredo Soto. The Casa Argentina complex houses around 12,000 students, researchers and artists from 150 countries in the course of a year. Many of the latter had described the residence as a “mini-dictatorship” under Muzio, who had told the French press that his most fundamental aims included “extirpating the extreme left and woke ideology,” also withdrawing the plaque commemorating the victims of Argentina’s 1976-1983 military dictatorship. Muzio had also hosted events of the Spanish, Hungarian and Polish as well as French far right presenting a plan to dismantle the European Union.
JUVENILE DELINQUENT DENIED PAROLE
The Lomas de Zamora Criminal Appeals Court last Tuesday overturned the habeas corpus suspending the application of the new régime for juvenile delinquents in Buenos Aires Province, issued by juvenile judge Marta Pascual opposing the lowering of the age of criminal responsibility from 16 to 14 and granting parole to the youngster who had killed nine-year-old Umma Aguilera in 2024
SIDE UPDATED
The government last Monday announced that it would be decreeing a new statute to modernise SIDE intelligence, making its agents more professional with careers and promotions based on training and performance instead of seniority or political loyalties and activities.
MILITARY PROTECTION FOR OLIVOS
Casa Militar bodyguards will be taking over within the next two months all security functions at Olivos presidential residence and all other residences used by President Javier Milei, a government communiqué informed on Thursday. The measure implies dissolution of the Administración General de la Residencia Presidencial de Olivos. The new bodyguards will have to co-ordinate efforts with the Federal Police officers attached to the presidential residence.
JAVIER FAUSTINO MILEI
President Javier Milei honoured Teachers’ Day last September 11 by using artificial intelligence to simulate a dialogue with his 1868-74 predecessor Domingo Faustino Sarmiento, defining their common ground as both being considered “mad” due to their provocative vehemence. Milei also thanked the president famous for his educational reforms for having inspired him to teach economics “so that Argentines could learn how the politicians robbed them via inflation and taxes” before concluding with a conciliatory: “Today on Teachers’ Day we thank all teachers for their civilizing work. Very many thanks to all teachers throughout Argentina.”
MESSI’S LAST DANCE
AFA Argentine Football Association president Claudio 'Chiqui' Tapia last Tuesday set the stage for superstar Lionel Messi’s farewell match from the national squad will be an “unforgettable” friendly against Benin at River Plate’s Monumental Stadium on October 6, playing with his teammates from the 2022 Qatar World Cup champions. Beforehand, Argentina will be playing friendly matches against Bolivia and Burkina Faso.
