Bachelor of Economics (UBA). Economic Analyst of Libertad y Progreso.
(Reuters) – The Argentine Commercial Exchange (ICA) would have reached a positive balance of 1,239 million dollars in July, mainly due to the decrease in imports due to the fall in domestic demand for products, according to the average of a survey from Reuters.
Estimates among seven local and foreign analysts also showed a median with a surplus of 1.2 billion dollars for the ICA for the seventh month of the year.
“As has been happening in recent months, the dynamics (of the ICA) does not necessarily respond to an improvement, since it is entirely explained by the collapse of imports,” said economist Matías Rajnerman of the Ecolatina consultancy.
The projections of the surveyed analysts ranged from a minimum positive trade balance of $1 billion to a maximum of $1,467 million for the July ICA.
The South American country imposed a mandatory isolation since the end of March in order to reduce the spread of COVID-19 in the country, a decision that further affected an economy hit by a prolonged recession, high inflation -which could be around 40% in 2020- and tight exchange controls.
The result in the July trade balance is explained more “by a fall in imports, the result of the fall in domestic demand, rather than by a growth in exports,” said Natalia Motyl, economist at the Libertad y Progreso consultancy.
Analysts agreed that despite the steep fall in imports, exports also reflected a decline in their year-on-year comparison.
The National Institute of Statistics and Censuses (INDEC), according to its publication calendar, will release the official ICA data for July on Tuesday afternoon.
