Argentina’s central bank bought no dollars on Monday or Tuesday, the first back-to-back pause of the year, La Nación reported, and the wholesale dollar then closed at 1,542 pesos on Wednesday, a record in nominal terms (not adjusted for inflation), according to the bank’s reference rate.
The bank said in its daily reports that it made no purchases on either day. Analysts said it held back to avoid adding pressure to the exchange rate after Brazil’s real fell as much as 9% on Monday following Lula’s re-election. Market operators said the Treasury sold about US$100 million that day to hold the rate down and bought back part of it on Tuesday.
Until now the bank had bought dollars on almost every trading day of 2026 under a program to accumulate reserves, buying about US$15.8 billion in all. Gross reserves stood at US$50.58 billion at Tuesday’s close, the bank reported, US$99 million more than the day before.
The wholesale rate, the one banks and companies trade at, was up from 1,538 on Tuesday and 1,541 on Monday, when it had set its previous record. Banco Nación, the state bank, sold dollars to the public at 1,560 pesos on Wednesday.
Domingo Cavallo, a former economy minister, told Ahora Play that the government manages the exchange rate the way Guillermo Moreno managed prices, a reference to the Kirchner-era trade secretary who policed prices. Cavallo called for lifting the remaining currency restrictions on companies and for the bank to buy dollars under predictable rules. The government has argued that the market is too small for the bank to buy a fixed daily amount; Cavallo replied that the market is small because the government made it small.