(Reuters) – The International Monetary Fund (IMF) will discuss a new $ 20 billion loan for Argentina at an informal meeting next week, Bloomberg News reported on Friday.
The IMF will discuss an extended funding of four years of approximately 15 billion special drawing rights, according to the report.
A spokesperson for the IMF refused to comment on the report. The Argentinian government did not immediately respond to Reuters’ requests for comments.
On Wednesday, Argentina’s lower room adopted a decree published earlier in the month in support of a new IMF program, allowing the government to start the talks with the IMF to strengthen the central bank reserves and potentially cancel capital checks.
The decree, without specifying the amount in dollars, said that the planned installation of the extended fund would imply a reimbursement period of 10 years with a period of grace of four years and six months. He added that the new funds would be used to repay the Treasury debt to the Central Bank.
Argentina, which fights with reserves of negative net foreign currency after years of surpassing, monetary crises and regular defects, is the largest borrower of the IMF with 22 loan programs to date. He still reimburses an agreement of $ 2022,44 billion.
IMF spokesperson Julie Kozack, March 6, told a press conference that the IMF “continued to make good progress towards a program, and we are working constructively with the Argentine authorities in this regard”.
Once these negotiations are completed, any final loan agreement would require the approval of the IMF board of directors.
But the IMF procedures for “exceptional access” – higher loan amounts that exceed the normal borrowing limits of a country – require greater initial involvement of the board of directors.
This includes consultations between IMF staff and the board of directors “before concluding discussions on a program and making any public declaration on an proposed level of access”, according to procedures.
(Report by Rajveer Singh Pardesi in Bengaluru; edition by Marguerita Choy)
