Peronism beats Mauricio Macri in the elections and the peso collapses

• Primary: Macri's hard defeat against Cristina Kirchner's candidate in the primary elections in Argentina
• Analysis: Fight or agree, the dilemma of Macri and Argentina

A weakened government, the value of the liquefied peso and the paralyzed banks. The electoral beating that Peronism gave Mauricio Macri has installed Argentina in a new economic crisis. On a Monday of pure uncertainty, the question was whether the Government would seek basic agreements with the opposition to calm the financial markets, avoid an inflationary explosion and reach the transfer of command on December 10 in an orderly manner.

That doubt has cleared up soon. In the middle of the afternoon, and with the peso devalued by 25% compared to Friday's close, Alberto Fernández, the candidate of Peronism, has lowered expectations: "(The president) didn't call me in all these years, I don't think have to call me now. "

Macri answered him moments later at a press conference. "The election in October is going to be a good opportunity, the change continues, we are going to reverse this election yesterday to go to the second round in November." The head of state did not stay there: "Unfortunately today we had a very bad day, today we are poorer than before the PASS (primary) (...). That this electoral process does not punish the Argentines even more. Alternative to the government has no credibility in the world. Kirchnerism should do that self-criticism. On Friday we were in a situation where the dollar went down, Argentine companies were bought and inflation went down. And today everything turns around, the country risk goes up 350 points in an hour, shows that there is a serious problem between Kirchnerism and the world. "

The great winner of the elections, who had just met with Cristina Kirchner, his candidate for vice president and head of state between 2007 and 2015 assured bluntly when asked about the devaluation of the peso that "is what happens when a government lies about the course of the economy. "

Fernandez spoke from the security and the advantage of having obtained 47% of the votes against 32% of Macri. An overwhelming triumph that defines a lot politically, but nothing formally: Sunday was a primary to define candidates, the elections will be only on October 27 . There are 75 days left until then, and experience indicates that two and a half months are an eternity in Argentina. Just look at what happened with the value of the dollar, the nodal price of the Argentine economy, which jumped from 47.55 pesos on Friday to 57.30 today.

"Surely this difficult day will have an impact," said the governor of Buenos Aires, María Eugenia Vidal , aware that any movement of the dollar impacts prices. And that, in a context that is not precisely relaxed, because Argentina lives with an annual inflation of 45%.

Argentina's numbers are crazy: interest rates in banks rose 74% on Monday, shares of Argentine companies on Wall Street plummeted 60% and Argentine bonds lost 20%. All, in an extremely unreal day in the financial markets, because the operations were minimal, although the impact on the mood of the population was enormous.

On Monday he offered a bitter awakening to the Argentines. To the devaluation of the peso, which was already observed in the early morning in international places, a classic of the moments of crisis in the country was added: the digital services of its banks did not work, and when they appeared in the branches they were told that they could not go through the box because the system had been "dropped."

In those hours spoke Roberto Lavagna , former Argentine Economy Minister and third in the Sunday elections: "Argentina needs quick gestures." Lavagna was minister of Eduardo Duhalde after the megacrisis of 2001, and during part of the Government of Néstor Kirchner . His word is therefore valuable in a country that is well aware of the memory of that crisis and the confiscation of savings deposited in banks, the same that today almost did not allow operations to their retail customers.

The brutal devaluation crisis unleashed in April 2018, which brought the value of the dollar from 18 to 40 pesos in a few months, boosted inflation, hit wages and increased unemployment and poverty. To this was added that the Government insisted on the same recipes and reacted too late with heterodox measures that would bring relief to the population. That land devastated in the economic and social sectors seriously affected Vidal, who was seen as the natural successor of Macri in 2023 and lost yesterday by 49 to 32% to Axel Kicillof , former Minister of Economy of Cristina Kirchner.

Nor did the issue of corruption influence the vote of Argentines. Neither the 13 prosecutions and seven requests for pre-trial detention for the former president, released thanks to her senator's privileges, nor the shocking journalistic revelation of the newspaper La Nación, known as the "corruption notebooks" a year ago.

In his speech celebrating the triumph, Fernández sought on Sunday night to bring calm to the country: "We do not come here to restore a regime, we come to create a new Argentina in which all take place. The concept of revenge, of crack and anything that divides us. We are going to make that country, I owe it to Estanislao (his son) and you to all his children (...) Those who are uneasy not to be uneasy. We were never crazy, always we fix the problems that others generated. Argentina is now giving birth to another country. "

But the beginning of Monday was fierce and put tons of pressure on Macri, which must define whether to continue the electoral battle or seek an agreement with Peronism. It seems difficult to combine both.

Continuing to fight means dreaming of a Homeric feat, a chimera: reverse the result. Agreeing means calling Fernandez and, together, generating a consensus that gives predictability and peace of mind to the economy. The problem is that Argentina was never a country of consensus, but of confrontations . And on election night both candidates ratified that tradition. Macri did not congratulate the rival for the victory and Fernández did not have any word of consideration towards the head of state, who in the midst of the devastation for the result did have the presence of mind to give a press conference and answer critical questions from the media .

Everything indicates that Macri must comply with the merit of being the first non-Peronist democratic president in 91 years who manages to finish the term. And in that sense the question in the country is how it ends. The memory of the long transition between Raúl Alfonsín and Carlos Menem in 1989, in the midst of a terrifying hyperinflation, is present. Alfonsín resigned from the position five months before, emptied of power before the request of a dollar "recontra high" that the future ministers of Menem demanded. Peronism, the Argentines know, is not characterized by the care of institutional forms, and when it smells the proximity of power acts like the shark before a drop of blood in the sea: it comes out to bite. The problem this time is that, if you bite too much, it will complicate the chances of your own government.

According to the criteria of The Trust Project

• Mauricio Macri
• Argentina Elections

ArgentinaFinancial crash and devaluation of the peso in Argentina after the victory of Alberto Fernández

Primary: Macri's very hard defeat against Cristina Kirchner's candidate in the primary elections in Argentina

COMICIOS Argentina, polarized between Mauricio Macri and Cristina Kirchner