The United States plans to extend a US$20-billion swap line to Argentina and is ready to buy the country’s foreign bonds, providing much-needed financial support to President Javier Milei as he tries to regain investor confidence and stem a run on the peso.
Terms of the deal are still being negotiated, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said in a post on X early Wednesday that sparked a brief rally in Argentine assets. He made clear in an interview on Fox News that the financing was meant to help Milei ahead of a crucial midterm vote next month, aiding an ideological ally in a region where US President Donald Trump has few friends in power.
“I don’t think the market has lost confidence in him,” Bessent said, referring to the Argentine leader. “I think the market is looking in the rearview mirror and looking at decades – about a century – of terrible Argentine mismanagement.”
Milei, a free-market reformer, has faced mounting financial pressure in the two-and-a-half weeks since his party lost a key Buenos Aires Province election by a landslide, a bad omen just a month ahead of congressional elections.
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