The board of directors of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) will meet next Friday to discuss Argentina’s request for a debt agreement, the institution’s spokesman announced on Saturday.
The Argentine Senate definitively approved this Thursday the agreement between Buenos Aires and the IMF on the refinancing of the debt of 45,000 million dollars with the Fund. The deal still needs to be signed by the IMF’s board of directors.
“The legislative approval is an important signal that Argentina is committed to policies that will foster more sustainable and inclusive growth,” IMF spokesman Gerry Rice said in a statement.
But he also stressed that it is necessary “to take into account the rapidly changing global environment, including the war in Ukraine.”
Therefore, the IMF Executive Board will meet “to discuss Argentina’s request for an IMF-supported program on Friday, March 25,” he added.
It also indicated that the Argentine authorities had “informed the IMF that they will combine the repayment obligations due on March 21 and 22 in a single amortization before March 31, 2022, for a total amount equivalent to some 2,014 million special rights of turn”.
The spokesman stressed that Argentina will thus remain “up to date with its payments to the IMF and, therefore, will not incur in arrears.”
Argentina and the IMF reached an agreement on March 3 on a debt refinancing program of almost 45,000 million dollars, inheritance of a record loan taken in 2018 by the previous government of liberal Mauricio Macri.
This is the 13th agreement between the Fund and Argentina since the country’s return to democracy in 1983. Before this latest pact, Argentina was at risk of default.
