Stories that caught our eye: April 10 to 17

 

PRICES KEEP RISING

Inflation continued its acceleration of the last 10 months to reach 3.4 percent, the INDEC national statistics bureau reported on Tuesday, thus accumulating 9.4 percent for the first half of the year at an annual rate of 32.6 percent. At the start of the week Economy Minister Luis Caputo had already anticipated that March inflation would top three percent. Education at home (rising 12.1 percent with the start of the school year) and fuel prices abroad with the Iranian crisis were identified as the chief culprits – petrol has gone up 23 percent since that crisis commenced at the end of February while it now costs a six-digit sum in pesos to fill a tank. The two key figures of food & beverages and core inflation (excluding regulated and seasonal prices) were both close to the overall average at 3.4 and 3.2 percent respectively although beef prices climbing by up to eight percent more than doubled that figure. Just before last weekend City Hall statisticians announced March inflation as three percent, up from February’s 2.6 percent at an annual rate of 32.1 percent – they also held education (8.6 percent) and fuels (via transport up six percent) to be mainly responsible.

 

AMCHAM SUMMIT

One of the most important business events of the year unfolded Tuesday with the United States Chamber of Commerce in Argentina bringing together various top-level speakers hosted by AmCham’s new president Mariana Schoua. They included President Javier Milei, Economy Minister Luis Caputo, Foreign Minister Pablo Quirno, Supreme Court Chief Justice Horacio Rosatti, Governors Alfredo Cornejo (Mendoza), Rogelio Frigerio (Entre Ríos) and Alberto Weretilneck (Río Negro) and US Ambassador Peter Lamelas. See inside for an eye-witness account.

 

CAPUTO IN DC

An economic team headed by Economy Minister Luis Caputo and Central Bank Governor Santiago Bausili arrived in Washington DC last Wednesday to attend the Spring Meetings of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank but with their top priority to clinch remittance of US$1 billion pending approval in the final review of the current stage of the extended fund facility (rapidly secured the same day). The agenda also included a meeting with IMF Managing Director Kristalina Georgieva where a waiver for shortfalls in last year’s accumulation of Central Bank reserves was to be sought even if the government has already bought up half the US$10 billion pledged for this year. The IMF would like to see greater speed in both this area and in the total elimination of currency and capital controls and energy subsidies. The day before Caputo’s arrival the IMF downscaled its projection of Argentine growth for this year to 3.5 from four percent while US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent showered renewed praise on the Javier Milei administration for the “daily accumulation of (Central Bank) reserves” and “taking 10 million Argentines out of poverty.” On Thursday it emerged that Argentina could be in line for a further US$2 billion in loan guarantees from the World Bank after Caputo met its president Ajay Banga.

 

MILEI ISRAEL-BOUND

Ahead of embarking this weekend on his third trip to Israel to join that country’s Independence Day celebrations, President Javier Milei met up with DAIA (Delegación de Asociaciones Israelitas Argentinas) chief Mauro Berenstein in the Casa Rosada last Wednesday afternoon. Milei’s agenda could be subject to alterations since the country governed by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu remains at war but the President is due to be decorated with the Presidential Medal of Honour by his Israeli counterpart Isaac Herzog and is also expected to announce the transfer of the Argentine Embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem but this has yet to be confirmed. Last Thursday Milei gave an interview to an Israeli television channel, saying: “I never speculate about Israel – it’s a just cause.”

 

GROSSI IN TIME’S TOP 100

Rafael Grossi, 65, director-general of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) and bidding to become the next secretary-general of the United Nations in the course of this year, was included by the prestigious United States magazine Time in their annual list of the world’s 100 most influential people. When nominating Grossi, Time paid tribute to his “effective diplomacy at a time when world governance is losing popularity” in confronting such complex challenges as Ukraine or Iran.

 

MORE ON ADORNI

Two women who helped to finance Cabinet Chief Manuel Adorni’s purchase of a Caballito flat testified in court last Monday, maintaining that the top official owed them US$70,000 plus interest after they lent him a private mortgage loan of US$100,000. Two other female creditors of Adorni, both senior citizens, testified regarding the same property last Wednesday, when it also emerged that Adorni had taken a 12-day holiday on the Caribbean island of Aruba with his family in late 2024, flying there first class.

 

MORE MAHIQUES

The Mahiques family continues to spread its wings – while the head of the family Carlos Mahiques battles in the Senate to stay on as judge beyond the age of 75, his son Esteban was designated last Thursday the Chief Cabinet Advisor to his brother, Juan Bautista, the new Justice minister since March 5 and picking his brother the following day but the appointment was only formalised this week. Like his ministerial brother Esteban Mahiques is closely linked to Argentine Football Association (AFA) as a member of its Discipline Tribunal. A third brother Ignacio works at the City Prosecutor’s Office.

 

MORE REVOLVING DOORS

President Javier Milei last Monday formalised the appointment of Maximo Dupont as the new director of the BICE (Banco de Inversión y Comercio Exterior) bank via Decree 239/2026 published in the Official Gazette, replacing José Ignacio de Mendiguren, a former head of the UIA Argentine Industrial Union. The bank aims to finance productive investments and foreign trade operations with a special focus on PyME small and medium-sized companies and regional sectors.

 

RAIN ALERT

Not everybody took note because most of the rainfall came in the small hours of Wednesday but a torrential downpour flooded City streets, disrupted traffic and caused power cuts for over 16,000 people. In just 90 minutes there were up to 135 millimetres in some neighbourhoods, the equivalent of an entire month. Rainfall continued sporadically throughout the day with the Weather Service (SMN in its Spanish acronym) issuing an alert as to intense downpours to come in the near future in this City and much of Greater Buenos Aires.

 

VD ALERT

Last year’s total of diagnosed cases of syphilis fell just one short of 46,800 for an incidence of 117.2 cases per 100,000 inhabitants – a figure constantly on the rise in the last 15 years apart from the pandemic lockdown years of 2021 and 2022, health authorities informed last Wednesday. Intensified vigilance and notification are thought to be major factors in the increase. In 2022 some eight million adults aged between 15 and 49 were reported as having picked up the infection worldwide, of whom 3.36 million were in the Americas.

 

AVIATION RECORD

Last month saw a new record set for Argentine aviation: 4,636,151 passengers (including 1,655,745 international passengers) across 35,956 flights, three percent up from the previous month, the ANAC (Administración Nacional de Aviación Civil) regulatory agency revealed on Thursday. Inland airports were in the forefront of this trend with the highest percentages of expansion. February was also a new record and every month could set a record in a more competitive “open skies” market, ANAC said.

 

PRIZE PHOTO

News photographer Tadeo Bourbon has been awarded a prize by the international World Press Photo (WPP) organisation for his photograph of the elderly Father Jorge ‘Chueco’ Romero being arrested by Coast Guards while joining pensioners in their weekly protest march outside Congress last May 14. Pablo E. Piovano was also recognised for his documentary El costo humano de las agrotóxicos, which had already been awarded a prize in 2024. This year no less than 3,747 photographers from 141 countries submitted 57,376 photographs taken last year for the 42 prizes awarded by the Amsterdam-based organisation (distributed among six continents and subcontinents receiving seven each). Bourbon’s photo was titled ‘La Argentina de Milei.’

 

ANGEL DEATH PROBED

Comodoro Rivadavia judge Alejandro Solís last Tuesday ordered Mariela Altamirano and Michel González to be remanded in custody for six months while investigating the homicide of the former’s four-year-old son Ángel López with the couple protesting their innocence but the magistrate affirming his “certainty that these [20 fatal] blows [to his head] were no accident.”

 

MORE IAN CABRERAS AT RISK?

Threats of more school shootings like the one claiming the life of Ian Cabrera in the Santa Fe town of San Cristóbal at the start of this month were almost epidemic in Argentina last week with alerts sounded in no less than seven districts: Buenos Aires Province, Capital Federal, Tucumán, Mendoza, Córdoba, Neuquén and Tierra del Fuego. School authorities believe that the threats daubed on corridor walls were organised from social networks with the aim of skipping class. No smoke without fire – last Thursday a San Martín schoolgirl stabbed an older pupil.

 

MESSI BUYS CLUB

Superstar Lionel Messi astounded the football world last Thursday by officially confirming his purchase of the Spanish fifth-division side UE Cornellà de la Tercera RFEF, founded in 1951 with a stadium capacity of less than 6,000.