News of opinion and analysis

Milei’s cuts are making credit harder to collect in Argentina

04-06-2025 10:30 Just over a year and a half since Javier Milei took office, businesses and households are under strain from stagnant wages and lingering inflation.

Cristina Fernández de Kirchner gives a speech on the 215th anniversary of the May Revolution that led to Argentina's independence from Spain at the Polo Cultural Saldias in Buenos Aires on May 25, 2025.

POLITICS – ANALYSIS

CFK's return risks dividing opposition in boon for Milei

03-06-2025 14:22 Cristina Fernández de Kirchner's decision to run in September’s legislative elections in Buenos Aires Province will set the stage for the national midterm vote the following month.

Politics – Analysis

From ‘Caputito’ to ‘Fat Dan’ – weird scenes of digital disinformation

31-05-2025 06:39 Milei and his digital pit-bulls appeal to freedom of expression while relying on manipulative and even false information to get their message across, while fostering censorship and hate of the traditional media. Freedom of speech for those who express the same kind of things as me, censorship for the rest.

by Agustino Fontevecchia

ESPIONAGE & FREEDOM OF THE PRESS

SIDE: from the sewers to the forces of heaven

31-05-2025 06:38 Until now, the path taken by Javier Milei’s “forces of heaven” is no different from their predecessors.

by Javier Calvo

CAMPAIGN COMMENTS

Where angels fear to tread

31-05-2025 06:33 The demolition job suffered by PRO in the City has most provinces now thinking twice about advancing their elections and exposing local hegemonies to the forces of heaven.

by Michael Soltys

As I see it

Censorship is making a comeback just about everywhere

31-05-2025 06:28 Milei has a habit of shouting “Freedom, damn it!” whenever the opportunity arises, but he is clearly an authoritarian at heart who does not take kindly to criticism.

by James Neilson

Analysing Argentina

Milei chooses to ignore emerging consensuses

31-05-2025 06:23 With less than five months to the midterm vote, nothing seems to be standing in the way of a good result for the government. But Milei 2025 should already start thinking about Milei 2027

by Marcelo J. García

Paka Paka will launch new programming in July ranging from Dragon Ball Z to Tuttle Twins, a US cartoon series that includes animated versions of free-marketeer economists Milton Friedman, Friedrich Hayek and Ludwig von Mises.

POLITICS

Milei gets Tuttle Twins to teach free markets to kids

29-05-2025 08:53 President Javier Milei is relaunching a state-run TV channel for kids set to feature a cartoon teaching free-market economics while stressing the evils of taxes and communism.

The Central Bank of Argentina in Buenos Aires.

ANALYSIS: SHOCK THERAPY

Milei intervenes in currency market despite letting peso float

28-05-2025 11:36 Argentina’s government has intervened in the currency markets to influence the peso’s value and is likely to miss reserve accumulation targets.

DISCREDIT & DISTRACTION

Darín and Milei’s online army: empanadas or rotten fish

27-05-2025 14:43 Argentina’s government, along with its army of online trolls and sympathetic journalists, used the price of empanadas to mock Ricardo Darín and distract from the economic crisis. Viral mockery and aligned media coverage helped them avoid talking about frozen wages, austerity, and the loss of purchasing power.

by Nicolas Gonzalez

Ricardo Darín during an event for the series ‘El Eternauta’ at Centro Costa Salguero in Buenos Aires on April 29.

PRICE COMPLAINTS

Milei officials beef with Darín over price of a dozen empanadas

26-05-2025 20:43 Actor Ricardo Darín draws Milei administration’s ire by complaining about the price of a dozen empanadas.

Public works have been suspended across Argentina.

MILEI’S AUSTERITY MEASURES

Six provinces demand over US$9 billion from national government

26-05-2025 14:58 Provinces of Buenos Aires, La Pampa, La Rioja, Formosa, Santiago del Estero and Santa Fe – mostly all opposition controlled – are demanding US$9.376 billion in outstanding debt from President Javier Milei’s government.

by Gonzalo Martínez

As I see it

Milei wants to paint Argentina violet

24-05-2025 06:49 Milei and his sister are well aware that political loyalties usually owe more to a person’s sense of belonging to a vaguely defined community than to reasoned arguments. Handouts can help, but peer pressure counts for more than anything else.

by James Neilson

Campaign comments

Milei’s purple patch

24-05-2025 06:38 The headlines all reflect a Milei triumph and a PRO catastrophe (the government objectives in almost equal measure), both accurate enough but also relative.

by Michael Soltys

POLITICS – ANALYSIS

Battle royale

24-05-2025 06:27 Politically, Milei is the son of fragmentation. Now, he’s consolidating his forces thanks to the weakness of dispersed opponents.

by Agustino Fontevecchia

Analysing Argentina

A whirlwind of votes, a black hole of dollars

24-05-2025 06:06 Argentines know their history, and they have enjoyed spending sprees in the past at the cost of the Central Bank, which invariably ended in economic catastrophe: in the late 1970s, in the 1990s, in the mid- and late 2000s. Milei will have to work hard to convince them that things will not be as they were.

by Marcelo J. García

'Crisis social, pandemia y colonialismo inglés: una mirada de la Argentina a través del sainete y del seminario Don Quijote de Eduardo Sojo'; by Victoria Cox, Ediciones Diotima, 2024, 96 pages.

BOOKS & LITERATURE

Things ain’t what they used to be – and nor were they then

23-05-2025 15:12 'Crisis social, pandemia y colonialismo inglés: una mirada de la Argentina a través del sainete y del seminario Don Quijote de Eduardo Sojo'; by Victoria Cox, Ediciones Diotima, 2024, 96 pages.

by Michael Soltys

BUSINESS & INVESTMENT

Argentina signals to investors IMF cash to come despite reserves

23-05-2025 10:14 Argentina expects to receive a US$2-billion disbursement from the IMF next month, regardless of whether nation hits target for rebuilding foreign reserves.

Economy Minister Luis Caputo at the AmCham 2025 Summit in Buenos Aires.

AMCHAM SUMMIT 2025

Investments, remonetisation, reforms – doubts of US business leaders

22-05-2025 09:31 Milei’s RIGI incentives do not convince, the 'quasi-whitewash' needs "rationality" and reform bills into 2026. Electoral atmosphere at this year’s AmCham Summit and business optimism.

by Eugenia Muzio

Lack of driving licence plates in Argentina.

ANALYSIS: SHOCK THERAPY

Milei’s cuts have Argentines driving new cars with paper licence plates

21-05-2025 13:03 The Milei administration is downsizing the National Mint, known as Casa de Moneda, cutting nearly 40 percent of its staff. In addition to outsourcing the printing of money, private companies have been tapped to take over licence-plate production for cars.

ELECTIONS 2025: BUENOS AIRES CITY

30% in the City – just how well did La Libertad Avanza do?

20-05-2025 16:34 All the polls point to an Argentina split down the middle. Within those two universes increasingly extreme stances coexist on both sides.

ELECTIONS 2025: BUENOS AIRES CITY

City election reveals Argentina’s new democracy

19-05-2025 15:49 The internal rivalry within the right has finally been settled with Milei’s victory on Macri’s home turf.

by Eduardo Fidanza

ELECTIONS 2025: BUENOS AIRES CITY

PRO versus La Libertad Avanza: Chronicle of a death foretold?

18-05-2025 23:26 With the necessary caveats, the time that passed between the 2023 election and this weekend’s elections in Buenos Aires City could be seen as a remake of ‘The Sixth Sense’: PRO had been “dead” all along – but didn’t know it.

by Juan Luis González

President Javier Milei and Presidential Spokesperson Manuel Adorni, pictured in an election day photograph shared by the latter online.

POLITICS – ANALYSIS

Milei wins big in Buenos Aires City vote, dethroning Macri

18-05-2025 22:56 Javier Milei cements his hold on Argentina’s political right months before pivotal midterm elections.

President Javier Milei celebrates La Libertad Avanza's win in the Buenos Aires City legislative elections on May 18, 2025.

ELECTIONS 2025: BUENOS AIRES CITY

City elections: Winners and losers from a dramatic night

18-05-2025 21:55 Victory for President Milei’s La Libertad Avanza; PRO suffers worst defeat since taking power in Buenos Aires City almost two decades ago; Peronism finishes second.

Analysing Argentina

Re-election in 2027? It’s Milei’s to lose

17-05-2025 06:53 Milei has at hand all the variables that will determine his future. Winning or losing will depend on how he handles them. The more pragmatic and less ideological, the better.

by Marcelo J. García

Time is ticking for the Forces of Heaven.

CAMPAIGN COMMENTS

They also serve who only stand and wait

17-05-2025 06:31 Electoral tides notoriously shift in the final week and even the last minute.

by Michael Soltys

As I see it

Being pope in an irreligious age

17-05-2025 06:28 Leo XIV faces a most difficult dilemma.

by James Neilson

Former Women, Gender & Diversity minister Ayelén Mazzina.

GUEST COLUMN

Ayelén Mazzina: ‘Scrapping programmes that protected women is deeply perverse’

16-05-2025 13:49 Former Women, Gender & Diversity Minister Ayelén Mazzina responds to President Javier Milei’s decision to eliminate 13 programmes that were created at the portfolio she previously led during her time in office.

Triangulation: Mileis, Macris, Kirchnerites?

POLITICS – ANALYSIS

More to lose than to win

16-05-2025 10:15 In the City, the battle for first place is less interesting than the struggle between the Mileis and the Macris.

by Agustino Fontevecchia

JOSÉ 'PEPE' MUJICA (1935-2025)

‘Pepe’ Mujica and politics as tool for transformation

15-05-2025 14:26 José ‘Pepe’ Mujica, the former president of Uruguay, has passed away at the age of 89, leaving behind a legacy of social and economic transformation. During his administration, Argentina’s neighbour experienced historic growth, with inclusive policies that reduced poverty and promoted human rights.

by Cecilia Degl'Innocenti

Former Uruguay president José 'Pepe' Mujica takes Brazil President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva for a ride in his old Volkswagen Beetle.

OBITUARY: JOSÉ 'PEPE' MUJICA (1935-2025)

José Mujica: Happiness, wisdom and generosity

15-05-2025 14:06 If wisdom is the fruit of age, then José ‘Pepe’ Mujica lived long enough to share quite a bit. He was generous with it too, not wanting to take to the grave what had cost him so dearly to learn. During an eventful life, he learned that happiness doesn't come by way of sickle, chainsaw or hammer.

by Mónica Martin

Argentina’s currency has been trading below the midpoint of the 1,000 to 1,400 pesos per dollar band the government initially set on April 11.

ANALYSIS: SHOCK THERAPY

How Milei keeps peso strong ahead of midterm vote

14-05-2025 12:00 President Milei's government doubles down on a strong peso strategy, making it the cornerstone of his midterm election campaign.

The Foro de Desinformación 2025 (Disinformation Forum 2025), held on May 12 at the Centro Cultural Recoleta Cultural Centre in Buenos Aires, brought together diplomats and international experts who analysed strategies for countering disinformation.

‘Information war’

Experts and diplomats unite to fight disinformation threat

13-05-2025 10:40 European diplomats, journalists and fact-checking specialists sound the alarm at international forum on disinformation in Buenos Aires.

by Cecilia Degl'Innocenti

ANALYSING ARGENTINA

Fernández de Kirchner’s present points to Milei’s future

10-05-2025 07:55 Like Milei today, Fernández de Kirchner and Macri once believed their power was unlimited and their future bright. The way they engaged with their adversaries only came back later to haunt them.

by Marcelo J. García

OPINION & ANALYSIS

New songs and Peronism

10-05-2025 07:50 Kirchnerism has no lyrics for its new songs – every intervention by CFK against Milei is always geared to the economic terrain, but from the perspective of his collapse and not improving on his achievements.

by Jorge Fontevecchia

As I see it

Milei looks like a one-trick pony

10-05-2025 07:45 Chainsaws are great but they can maim or even kill users who are too weak or too clumsy to handle them properly.

by James Neilson

POLITICS & COMMUNICATION

Milei: Hate, peace, Popes and social media

10-05-2025 07:21 The Milei administration built its strength on synthetic power and effectively navigated the first part of the presidency. With the campaign fully underway, La Libertad Avanza will once again rely on their not-so-secret weapon.

by Agustino Fontevecchia

The quartet voting tomorrow (Chaco, Jujuy, Salta and San Luis) totals just under four million inhabitants or nine percent of the country’s population.

CAMPAIGN COMMENTS

Four-by-four voting

10-05-2025 07:20 Next weekend’s City race hogs the electoral limelight but there is voting even closer in time – like tomorrow when four provinces will be advancing their midterms.

by Michael Soltys

ANALYSIS: SHOCK THERAPY

Corporate defaults start piling up as Milei policies kick in

07-05-2025 12:28 As Javier Milei removes the distortions that once characterised Argentina’s economy, companies that bulked up on debt by exploiting exchange rate gaps are hurting.

Patricia Bullrich formally joins La Libertad Avanza at an event in Recoleta, Buenos Aires City. Among those watching on is Presidential Chief-of-Staff Karina Milei, President Javier Milei's sister/

POLITICS

Pato changes her spots (again) – Bullrich quits PRO, joins Milei's party

06-05-2025 22:05 Former party colleagues accuse national security minister of “turning her back on those who voted for her” and damaging her “reputation,” as political chameleon shifts sides once again.

by James Grainger

This illustration picture shows a 100 US dollar banknote on top of Argentinian pesos, in Buenos Aires on October 10, 2023.

'Blanqueo permanente'?

Experts say Argentina’s dollar thirst could open door for illegal funds

06-05-2025 12:26 Experts raise concerns about legal and tax consequences of using undeclared money after Economy Minister Luis Caputo urged Argentines to take their dollars out and "remonetise" the economy – without having to answer questions.

by Eugenia Muzio

Greater numbers of older adults are continuing to work into their later years, or looking for work, out of necessity.

TWO SIDES OF SAME COIN

Postcards of a crisis: youth unemployment and working into old age

06-05-2025 12:20 According to data from Argentina's Human Capital Ministry, 19.4% of young people aged 18 to 24 are unemployed. Meanwhile, greater numbers of older adults are continuing to work into their later years, or looking for work, out of necessity.

by Agustina Bordigoni

President Javier Milei appears on a streaming programme alongside Daniel 'Gordo Dan' Parisini.

POLITICS & MEDIA

Milei administration intensifies offensive against press

03-05-2025 10:23 President Javier Milei’s government is presenting the media and journalists to voters as the “new caste” and has decided to ramp up its attacks on reporters; New attack attempts to associate them with “lies” and “defamation,” with one online ally even calling for one journalist to be jailed.

by Pablo Varela

ANALYSING ARGENTINA

Milei’s Macri mirror

03-05-2025 07:14 Javier Milei and Luis Caputo want the economy to be booming when the country goes to vote in October. The question is how much it will cost them – and the country.

by Marcelo J. García

As I see it

When the machines stop working

03-05-2025 07:00 A growing proportion of decisions that affect people will be made by artefacts that can be hacked either by individuals working for hostile regimes, religious zealots who disapprove of Western ways or mere mischief-makers who get a kick out of provoking turmoil.

by James Neilson

City elections 2025: candidates for the legislature.

CAMPAIGN COMMENTS

The great debate

01-05-2025 09:39 The absurd multiplicity of 17 list-heading candidates for 30 City Legislature seats can be boiled down into a triangle of the PRO, libertarian and Peronist blocs, although this does not necessarily translate into only three candidates since others stand to make inroads.

by Michael Soltys

President Javier Milei and Chinese Premier Xi Jinping.

ARGENTINA-CHINA RELATIONS

Chinese business interests await gesture from Milei towards Xi

01-05-2025 09:18 Over-enthusiasm for the United States has damaged links with China, hampering political moves towards investment and trade agreements. A presidential trip to the Asian power is the key to smoothing the acrimony.

by Eugenia Muzio

GUEST COLUMN

Batakis: IMF betting on Milei because his failure would also be theirs

01-05-2025 07:42 This is a “political loan,” if not to say a campaign contribution, as in 2018.

A worker uses a counting machine for US$100 US banknotes at a currency exchange house in Buenos Aires.

ANALYSIS: SHOCK THERAPY

Savers buying up dollars after Milei lifts currency controls

30-04-2025 12:08 Savers are going back to the bank to buy dollars after President Javier Milei granted them complete freedom to do so.

Geopolitcs & trade

Xi is trying to turn world against US as Trump cuts trade deals

29-04-2025 11:03 Beijing officials are racing to turn foreign governments against the United States inside a 90-day window Trump has granted all nations — except China — to strike trade deals during a tariff reprieve.

GUEST COLUMN

Truth or dare? Tariffs or closure of economies

28-04-2025 15:43 Confusing an algebraic exercise of hypothetical theoretical equilibrium by transforming it into economic policy can only occur in a poorly prepared mind, or perhaps one trapped in a swarm of cognitive biases.

by Martín A. Morgenstern

Leandro Santoro, Silvia Lospensato, Manuel Adorni, Horacio Rodríguez Larreta, Ramiro Marra.

POLITICS: MIDTERMS 2025

Divided right bolsters Peronism in City as Karina’s strategy put to test

28-04-2025 14:24 Polling firms put the Peronist ticket led by Leandro Santoro ahead in Buenos Aires City. Battle between Manuel Adorni and Silvia Lospennato will set tone for electoral year.

by Giselle Leclercq

Archbishop of Buenos Aires Jorge García Cuerva and Vice-President Victoria Villarruel, during tributes to Pope Francis in the capital this week.

STATE & RELIGION

Church, Milei government play nice despite tensions, distrust

27-04-2025 20:35 Death of Pope Francis shines a spotlight on the relationship between Argentina’s religious leaders, the clergy and President Javier Milei’s government.

by Juan Pablo Kavanagh

As I see it

Goodbye to the Argentine papacy

26-04-2025 05:00 While some of the causes Bergoglio embraced may have been good, by adopting them he blurred the distinction between Catholicism and what most of the “progressive” atheists and agnostics who have long dominated Western culture already take for granted.

by James Neilson

Jorge Mario Bergoglio, the late Pope Francis.

OBITUARY: POPE FRANCIS (1936-2025)

The Pope from the 'ends of the earth' called to 'repair' the Church

26-04-2025 05:00 Jorge Bergoglio enters history as the first American Pope. During his time heading the Catholic Church, he reformed Vatican governance, pushed for peace and reconciliation and guided the Church through some of the darkest moments in recent years, taking measures against child abuse by members of the clergy.

by Darío Silva D'Andrea

Pope Francis and Argentina's recent presidents.

Analysing Argentina

The shepherd who lost his country

26-04-2025 05:00 Argentina electing Milei, just as an Argentine was running the Vatican on a unifying message, is as if John Paul II had seen his Polish compatriots vote for a version of Joseph Stalin, rather than Lech Wałęsa.

by Marcelo J. García

POPE FRANCIS (1936-2025)

Francis: The most important Argentine in history

26-04-2025 05:00 Monarchs, heads of state, religious leaders and the Catholic faithful will descend on the Vatican today in huge numbers as the world bids a final farewell to Pope Francis, the Flores-born kid who ascended to one of the powerful positions in the world.

by James Grainger

Marwan Gill meets Pope Francis at the Vatican.

GUEST COLUMN

Pope Francis and his message of brotherhood

25-04-2025 23:44 Theological, ideological or political differences must not become excuses to distance ourselves from each other. On the contrary, they must inspire us to engage even closer in meaningful dialogue.

by Marwan Gill

Mourners attend a rosary prayer in Saint Peter's Square on the day of Pope Francis' death in Vatican City

FUNERAL OF POPE FRANCIS

A simple funeral for Pope Francis becomes conduit to see Trump

25-04-2025 14:26 Funeral for Pope Francis risks being turned into high-profile stage for international diplomacy at a moment of geopolitical turmoil.

A delegation of the Argentine Holocaust Museum takes part in the March of the Living to honour the victims of the Holocaust in front of the main gate with the lettering 'Arbeit macht frei' (Work sets you free) at the Auschwitz Birkenau Memorial and Museum at the site of the former German Nazi concentration and extermination camp in Oswiecim, Poland, on April 24, 2025. The March of the Living in 2025 from the former Auschwitz I to Auschwitz II-Birkenau camps is dedicated to the 80th anniversary of the end of World War II and the liberation of the concentration camps in Nazi-occupied Europe, according to organisers.

REMEMBRANCE

Everyone needs to go to Auschwitz-Birkenau

25-04-2025 14:00 At this potentially dark hour, the Holocaust should serve as a message of what could lie ahead, if we continue fan the flames of hatred and fear.

by Agustino Fontevecchia

Jorge Bergoglio with Néstor Kirchner; Pope Francis with Cristina Fernández de Kirchner; with Mauricio Macri and Julia Awada; and with Alberto Fernández.

THE PONTIFF & POLITICS

A political Pope – probing Francis’ ties with Argentina’s presidents

23-04-2025 11:52 The man formerly known as Jorge Bergoglio recognised himself as being a political figure, long before his arrival in Rome. He once declared: "Christians should not be apolitical." A look at his links with Néstor Kirchner, Cristina Fernández de Kirchner, Mauricio Macri, Alberto Fernández and Javier Milei.

Nur Azman Rahim, Ambassador of Malaysia to Argentina, Paraguay and Uruguay.

GUEST COLUMN

Malaysia’s capital control (cepo) success – a journey beginning in Buenos Aires

19-04-2025 06:03 Malaysia’s success highlights the importance of policy credibility, clarity of purpose and exit strategy in the use of capital controls.

Milei and the International Monetary Fund.

POLITICS & ECONOMY – ANALYSIS

Milei dreams of re-election – with IMF's help

19-04-2025 06:00 Whether signing an IMF deal represents a “day of liberation” or one of mourning, it lifts a cloud of uncertainty and allows the political ecosystem to focus on upcoming elections.

by Agustino Fontevecchia

As I see it

Milei goes low in an effort to get high

19-04-2025 06:00 To get the big electoral majority he is after, Milei will have to persuade such people that he is the man, as was Juan Domingo Perón in his moment and after him, Carlos Menem and Néstor Kirchner.

by James Neilson

Analysing Argentina

Milei and the bicycle temptation

19-04-2025 06:00 The Milei government is confident it can make it to the midterm elections in October without major volatility. But this relative calm — won by force of debt — should not obscure the storm that was brewing before the cash injection.

by Marcelo J. García

Campaign comments

First day of the rest of the year

19-04-2025 06:00 Economists have hailed the exit from the cepo as a milestone but this columnist hesitates to consider it an electoral game-changer – there is both too much and too little time for that.

by Michael Soltys

This combination of pictures created on February 04, 2025 shows, L-R, US President Donald Trump in the Oval Office of the White House on February 3, 2025, in Washington, DC and China's President Xi Jinping speaking in Macau on December 19, 2024.

GEOPOLITICS & DIPLOMACY

Trump’s China trade war is forcing Latin America to pick a side

15-04-2025 14:02 Intensifying battle between world’s two largest economies has left governments grappling with the reality that their days of doing big business with Beijing without serious blowback from Washington are numbered.

A man holds a sign that reads 'Milei swindler. No to the IMF' during a protest of pensioners and union members against the government of Argentina's President Javier Milei in front of the National Congress in Buenos Aires on April 9, 2025

ARGENTINA & THE IMF

Another IMF loan: for Argentina, it’s Groundhog Day

12-04-2025 15:24 Generations of Argentines feel their country is trapped in a recurring cycle: yet another loan from the International Monetary Fund to rescue a volatile economy.

POLITICS – ANALYSIS

Milei gains 'breathing room' from his ties with Trump

12-04-2025 11:54 The support President Milei has garnered from the Trump administration stands in stark contrast to the mounting challenges on the home front.

by Pablo Varela