Narrow Your Choices

Refine By Topic

Refine By Series

Refine By Language

Refine By Date

—

Refine By IMF Taxonomy

Refine By JEL Taxonomy

Refine by LOC Taxonomy

Refine By THEMA Taxonomy

  • Print
  • Save

Western Hemisphere > Argentina

You are looking at 1 - 10 of 117 items for :

  • Type: Journal Issue x
  • Fiscal policy x
Clear All Modify Search
Cover IMF Staff Country Reports
Argentina: Ex-post Evaluation of Exceptional Access under the 2022 Extended Fund Facility Arrangement-Press Release; Staff Report; and Statement by the Executive Director for Argentina
International Monetary Fund. Western Hemisphere Dept.
On March 25, 2022, the IMF Executive Board approved a 30-month arrangement for Argentina supported by the Extended Fund Facility (2022 EFF). Amounting to US$44 billion (1,001 percent of quota), it was the second largest non-precautionary arrangement in the Fund’s history after the 2018 Stand-by Arrangement for Argentina (2018 SBA). Of the planned 10 reviews, eight were completed. The arrangement is set to expire at end-2024.
Keywords:
program ownership; IMF view; disinflation process; Policy strategy; lending decision; risk tolerance; Fiscal consolidation; International reserves; Inflation; Reserves accumulation; Global
Cover IMF Staff Country Reports
Uruguay: 2024 Article IV Consultation-Press Release and Staff Report
International Monetary Fund. Western Hemisphere Dept.
The 2024 Article IV Consultation discusses that in 2023, Uruguay confronted the impact of a once-in-a-century severe drought and external headwinds, but the economy remained resilient, owing to the authorities’ sound macroeconomic policies, the country’s political stability, and strong institutions. While economic growth decelerated in 2023, employment rose, and inflation fell within the target range. As inflationary pressures cooled off, the Banco Central del Uruguay started lowering its monetary policy rate in April 2023, while maintaining a contractionary stance. The economy is expected to strongly rebound in 2024, underpinned by the recovery of agricultural exports, increased cellulose production, easing of financial conditions and robust private consumption. Main risks are broadly balanced. Overall fiscal and external risks are low. The post-drought growth momentum creates opportunities for reinvigorating fiscal consolidation efforts. The crafting of the next five-year budget law opens an opportunity to recalibrate the fiscal rule targets to place debt on a downward path. Refinements to the fiscal rule would help consolidate recent credibility gains. Monetary policy should remain contractionary to ensure that inflation and inflation expectations stay within the target range in a sustained manner. Structural reforms are key to unlock potential growth, create policy space to preserve the country’s safety net and social cohesion, and support favorable sovereign debt ratings.
Keywords:
government bond bond market; inflation expectation; BCU inflation target; data ROSC reassessment; support policy continuity; Policy issue; Inflation; Fiscal stance; Fiscal councils; Anti-money laundering and combating the financing of terrorism (AML/CFT); Caribbean; Global
Cover IMF Working Papers
Debt Surges—Drivers, Consequences, and Policy Implications
Florian Schuster
,
Marwa Alnasaa
,
Lahcen Bounader
,
Il Jung
,
Jeta Menkulasi
, and
Joana da Mota
Many countries find themselves with elevated debt levels, increased debt vulnerabilities, and tight financing conditions, while also facing increased spending needs for development and transition to a greener economy. This paper aims to place the current debt landscape in a historical context and investigate the drivers of debt surges, to what degree they result in a crisis as well as examine post-surge debt trajectories and under what conditions debt follows a non-declining path. We find that fiscal policy and stock-flow adjustments play important roles in debt dynamics with the valuation effects arising from currency depreciation explaining more than half of stock flow adjustments in LICs. Debt surges are estimated to result in a financial crisis with a probability of 11–20 percent and spending-driven fiscal expansions during debt surges tend to result in a high probability of non-declining debt path.
Keywords:
Public debt; debt surges; financial crisis; stock-flow adjustment; exchange rate depreciation; fiscal expansion; debt surge; surge episode; surge attribute; post debt path; surge debt trajectory; Contingent liabilities; Global
Cover Policy Papers
Operational Guidance Note On Program Design and Conditionality
International Monetary Fund. Strategy, Policy, & Review Department
This note aims to provide guidance on the key principles and considerations underlying the design of Fund-supported programs. The note expands on the previous operational guidance notes on conditionality published over 2003-2014, incorporating lessons from the 2018-19 Review of Conditionality, and other recent key policy developments including the recommendation of the Management’s Implementation Plan in response to Independent Evaluation Office (IEO)’s report on growth and adjustment in IMF-supported programs. The note in particular highlights operational advice to (i) improve the realism of macroeconomic forecast in programs and fostering a more systematic analysis of contingency plans and risks; (ii) improve the focus, depth, implementation, and tailoring of structural conditions (SCs), with due consideration of growth effects; and (iii) help strengthen the ownership of country authorities. Designed as a comprehensive reference and primer on program design and conditionality in an accessible and transparent manner, the note refers in summary to a broad range of economic and policy considerations over the lifecycle of Fund-supported programs. As with all guidance notes, the relevant IMF Executive Board Decisions remain the primary legal authority on matters covered in this note.
Keywords:
Conditionality; Conditionality guidelines; Use of Fund resources; Fund-supported adjustment programs; Debt sustainability analysis; Structural reform; Fragile and conflict-affected states; transparency policy; guidance note; Fund-supported program; financing gap; climate change policy assessment; policy note; existing IMF policy; financial support; Balance of payments need; Debt sustainability; Structural reforms; Global
Cover IMF Working Papers
Sovereign Debt
Mr. Leonardo Martinez
,
Mr. Francisco Roch
,
Francisco Roldán
, and
Mr. Jeromin Zettelmeyer
This paper surveys the literature on sovereign debt from the perspective of understanding how sovereign debt differs from privately issue debt, and why sovereign debt is deemed safe in some countries but risky in others. The answers relate to the unique power of the sovereign. One the one hand, a sovereign has the power to tax, making debt relatively safe; on the other, it also has control over its territory and most of its assets, making debt enforcement difficult. The paper discusses debt contracts and the sovereign debt market, sovereign debt restructurings, and the empirical and theoretical literatures on the costs and causes of defaults. It describes the adverse impact of sovereign default risk on the issuing countries and what explains this impact. The survey concludes with a discussion of policy options to reduce sovereign risk, including fiscal frameworks that act as commitment devices, state-contingent debt, and independent and credible monetary policy.
Keywords:
Sovereign Debt; Safe Debt; Debt Default; Debt Restructuring; Costs of Sovereign Default; Political Defaults; Fiscal Frameworks; State Contingent Debt; Original Sin; debt contract; short-term debt; market value; sovereign default; capital market exclusion; default decision; default event; payment terms; liquid asset; Securities markets; Fiscal rules; Global
Cover IMF Working Papers
Economic Activity, Fiscal Space and Types of COVID-19 Containment Measures
Amr Hosny
and
Kevin Pallara
This paper argues that the type of COVID-19 containment measures affects the trade-offs between infection cases, economic activity and sovereign risk. Using local projection methods and a year and a half of high-frequency daily data covering 44 advanced and emerging economies, we find that smart (e.g. testing) as opposed to physical (e.g. lockdown) measures appear to be best placed to tackle these trade-offs. Initial conditions also matter whereby containment measures can be less disruptive when public health response time is fast and public debt is low. We also construct a database of daily fiscal announcements for Euro area countries, and find that sovereign risk is improved under a combination of large support packages and smart measures.
Keywords:
COVID-19; fiscal measures; containment measures; fiscal space; sovereign risk.; containment measure; IMF working papers; public health response time; types of COVID-19 containment; CDS spread; infection case; Fiscal space; Credit default swap; COVID-19; Western Hemisphere; Global; Europe
Cover IMF Staff Country Reports
Argentina: Ex-Post Evaluation of Exceptional Access Under the 2018 Stand-By Arrangement-Press Release and Staff Report
International Monetary Fund. Western Hemisphere Dept.
On June 20, 2018, the Executive Board approved the largest stand-by arrangement in the Fund’s history, in support of Argentina’s 2018-21 economic program. After an augmentation in October 2018, access under the arrangement amounted to US$57 billion (1,227 percent of Argentina’s IMF quota). The program saw only four of the planned twelve reviews completed, and did not fulfil the objectives of restoring confidence in fiscal and external viability while fostering economic growth. The arrangement was canceled on July 24, 2020.
Keywords:
fund policy; policy choice; Argentina program; IMF arrangement; IMF financial support; government ownership; policy space; Inflation; Inflation targeting; Exchange rates; Fiscal consolidation; Global; Caribbean
Cover IMF Research Perspectives
IMF Research Perspectives: Spring/Summer 2021
International Monetary Fund. Research Dept.
IMF Research Perspectives: Spring/Summer 2021
Keywords:
IMF research perspective; government spending multiplier; R&D effort; IMF CSF; central bank financing; COVID-19; Bank credit; Fiscal stance; Global; Sub-Saharan Africa; Europe; Africa
Cover IMF Working Papers
Authorities’ Fiscal Forecasts in Latin America: Are They Optimistic?
Metodij Hadzi-Vaskov
,
Mr. Luca A Ricci
,
Alejandro M. Werner
, and
Rene Zamarripa
Do governments in Latin America tend to be optimistic when preparing budgetary projections? We address this question by constructing a novel dataset of the authorities’ fiscal forecasts in six Latin American economies using data from annual budget documents over the period 2000-2018. In turn, we compare such forecasts with the outturns reported in the corresponding budget documents of the following years to understand the evolution of fiscal forecast errors. Our findings suggest that: (i) for most countries, there is no general optimistic bias in the forecasts for the fiscal balance-to-GDP ratio (though there may be for the components); (ii) fiscal forecasts have improved for some countries over time, albeit they have worsened for others; (iii) in terms of drivers, we show that forecast errors for the fiscal balance-to-GDP ratio are positively correlated with GDP growth and terms of trade changes and negatively with GDP deflator surprises; (iv) forecast errors for public debt-to-GDP ratios are negatively associated with surprises to GDP growth; (v) lastly, budget balance rules seem to help contain the size of the fiscal forecast errors.
Keywords:
forecast bias; budget balance rule; GDP ratio; expenditure rule; revenue-to-GDP ratio; Fiscal stance; Budget planning and preparation; Fiscal rules; Caribbean
Cover IMF Working Papers
Public Debt Dynamics and Intra-Year Exchange Rate Fluctuations
Mr. Santiago Acosta Ormaechea
The public sector, in carrying out its operations, often incurs foreign currency denominated liabilities and, as such, is exposed to exchange rate fluctuations that could affect the value of public debt to GDP ratios over time. This paper shows that converting foreign currency denominated flows and stocks into local currency using the average and the end-of-period exchange rates, respectively, as envisaged in public finance manuals, gives rise to an identifiable stock-flow adjustment term—due to intra-year exchange rate fluctuations—that affects public debt accumulation. Importantly, the inclusion of this often-ignored stock-flow adjustment term is critical to accurately project public debt levels and any related indicator that could in turn inform about the risk of debt distress. Using a novel dataset covering 82 countries during 2008–19, the paper shows that this stock flow adjustment term is sizable in countries experiencing large exchange rate depreciations, namely above the 99th percentile of the full sample, reaching 1.2 percent of GDP. Interestingly, the measurement of policy-related concepts such as interest rate-growth differentials and debt stabilizing primary balances are also affected by intra-year exchange rate fluctuations, and in non-negligible ways.
Keywords:
Public debt dynamics; intra-year exchange rate fluctuations; interest rate-growth differential; debt stabilizing primary balance.; WP; year exchange rate fluctuation; debt projection; accumulation equation; end-of-period exchange rates; heightened exchange rate volatility; nominal exchange rate depreciation; debt stabilizing primary balance; Exchange rates; Fiscal stance; Currencies; Asset valuation; Global