Sergio Massa has already completed four months as Minister of the Economy and several of the objectives that he himself set for the first hundred days of his administration are still in the pipeline.

In his favor, Massa has currency crisis aborted that was generated after the resignation of Martin Guzmán and having obtained through the soybean dollar the enough foreign currency to meet the reserve goals agreed with the Monetary Fund.

In addition, it closed the debt agreement with the Paris Club and granted a bond of $ 56.000 for a million people without formal income.

But is without making several promises that he did the day he took over the Palacio de Hacienda and that are part of the outstanding debts of his management.

Bonus to private

In August, the minister said that he would convene “business and worker organizations” to “ensure a mechanism that allow the recovery of income from workers in the private sector” that “earn between 50,000 and 150,000 pesos.” After four months, the private bonus, which generates disagreements with Cristina Kirchner and the unions, still does not appear while inflation continues to liquefy purchasing power.

Help regional economies

Massa announced a credit program to increase the number of Argentine companies that export. Then he reinforced it with the promise that there would be a differentiated dollar for regional economies. Despite the fact that the soybean dollar is already in its second edition, the rest of the producers are still waiting. Until now, they only have the promise that there will be a drop in withholdings for regional economies in 2023.

investment funds loan

Upon taking office, Massa anticipated that the Government is “evaluating four REPO offers to strengthen reserves and repurchase sovereign debt” from “three international financial institutions and one sovereign fund.” At the time there was talk of loans for US$ 3,500 million of funds from Qatar and New York that so far they have come to nothing.

Conversion of social plans to jobs

The minister announced “a policy of reorganization of social programs” with a focus on “the return to the labor market”. Until now, the only concrete thing was a review by the AFIP about the conditions of the beneficiaries of the plans that it detected. irregularities in 250,000 cases. Of that total, 20,000 out of a universe of 1.3 million unsubscribed. But there was no progress in the transformation of plans into employment.

Release of dollars to import

Massa implemented a new system to give importers predictability. And he promised the companies that adhered to the different versions of Fair Prices that he would free them dollars to import inputs.

But with net reserves at the limit, the debt with importers only increases. It already reaches the US$ 9,000 million this month, and is expected to stretch to US$10 billion in January. This hits production and retracts the growth of the economy.

fight inflation

The resolution of inflation continues to be the great pending issue of management. In August, Massa’s first month in office, the price index was 7%. It fell to 6.2% in September, climbed to 6.3% in October and would settle at 5.5% in November. Massa’s recipe includes a dose of fiscal orthodoxy, deficit control and Central Bank issuance, plus price agreements, a recipe the minister was opposed to in principle, but which he later ended up adopting. Now Massa promises that inflation will reach the 3% in April, a goal that private analysts view as highly unlikely,

To the unfulfilled promises are added the initiatives that Massa launched but that have not yet started. In this list are noted variants of the tourism dollar. On the one hand, the Qatar dollar, which establishes a higher exchange rate of $356, for those who spend more than US$300 a month. Although the measure was implemented, the banks still have not resolved the crossing of information to find out if a person who has cards in different banks has exceeded the limit or not. The measure that would allow foreigners to settle the MEP dollar ($229) instead of the official one ($176) is also still in limbo.

One of the achievements of Masa’s administration was to obtain the support of the same Kirchnerism that had spent the last year and a half knocking down Martín Guzmán. That allowed him to gain credibility, but now analysts say that this effect is fading.

“A characteristic feature of Massa’s management is eclecticism. He does not hesitate to merge orthodox fiscal and monetary elements with discretionary interventions in the markets and spending measures that seek to satisfy specific political, social or sectoral demands,” they analyze from Abeceb.