Bail Out Argentina

https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2025/10/argentina-trump-milei-bailout/684427/?utm_source=reddit&utm_campaign=the-atlantic&utm_medium=social&utm_content=edit-promo

Posted by theatlantic

6 comments

  1. David Frum: “Sometimes even the Trump administration acts like a normal American government. The bailout of Argentina is one of those times.

    “The Trump administration is proposing to lend Argentina up to $20 billion to support its currency on financial markets. The plan is unpopular with Republicans and Democrats alike. Yet at a time when much of U.S. policy seems driven by a perverse hostility to the outside world, assistance to Argentina is a welcome exception that deserves support across the political spectrum.

    “Yes, the administration’s proposal completely contradicts Donald Trump’s rhetoric of ‘America First,’ but this rhetoric is wrong and self-harming. Yes, the bailout is motivated by Trump’s capricious favoritism. But in this case, Trump has at least chosen an appropriate beneficiary.

    “Yes, at least one hedge-fund friend of Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent’s stands to benefit. But there are hedge funds on every side of every financial bet, and saying no to the deal will also enrich somebody.

    “Bessent’s proposed bailout is an agreement to lend Argentina enough U.S. dollars to give time for the peso to devalue to market levels. To make the bailout a success, [Javier] Milei will have to do now what he arguably should have done at the start: eliminate the remainder of Argentina’s daunting mess of capital controls. A peso that can be freely traded at market prices will allow Argentina to return to world markets as a normal trading nation.”

    Read more: [https://theatln.tc/7QVEv4G8](https://theatln.tc/7QVEv4G8)

  4. I thought their new president had the magic trick to fix the economy or so they called. Wasn’t austerity supposed to solve all the problems? Now the US has to borrow money to lend money to Argentina? Why? What do the Americans get? They also compete with the American beef industry

  5. Don’t bailout Argentina.

    “Supporting the currency on the exchange markets” is not a valid reason for a bailout. It goes directly against the measures that Milei had been promoting and pushing up until now and it’s only being done to try and get him to not be obliterated in the coming elections.

  6. The reality is that it’s pointless. Milei is doing this just to try to keep inflation in check until the mid term elections in October but, even if he wins by a landslide (he won’t), there are not enough sits in play to make a big difference. This is bad for USA and bad for Argentina, that already can’t repay it’s current debt.

    Milei needs to bite the bullet and let the market price the dollar. He is doing the opposite and he is putting back in place some exchange controls that he had removed to try to make it to the election. More of the same mistakes that brought Argentina to this place.

Comments are closed.