The Minister of Economy and presidential candidate of Argentina, Sergio Massa, traveled to Brazil to negotiate with President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva that Buenos Aires pay for its imports in yuan.
At a time when Brazil strengthens its commercial relationship with China and Argentina outlines its integration into the bloc formed by both giants along with India, Russia, and South Africa, known as BRICS, the Argentine government official seeks opportunities in the Chinese currency for his country, the local press reported.
During Massa’s visit to Argentina, the presidential candidate plans to meet with his Brazilian counterpart, Fernando Haddad, to review this monetary diversification.
The idea of the strategy is that Argentina can pay in Chinese currency for the imports it acquires from Brazil in a scenario where precisely the country governed by Alberto Fernández has Beijing and Brasilia as its main import partners, according to the Observatory of Economic Complexity, followed in descending order by the United States.
In this way, Argentina would be seeking to optimize the resources in dollars available to the Central Bank in a context of persistent inflation, a black market of currencies, and the strong debt of the South American country with the International Monetary Fund (IMF), according to an estimate by the Argentine newspaper Página 12.
The head of Brazil’s Finance Ministry, Haddad, said the import mechanism would convert yuan to reals, Brazil’s currency, for up to $140 million.
