Argentine president-elect names ex JP Morgan executive as finance minister [View all]

[forest444]

Last edited Thu Nov 26, 2015, 03:32 PM - Edit history (1)

Former JP Morgan executive and central bank chief Alfonso Prat-Gay will be Argentina's new finance minister when the government of President-elect Mauricio Macri takes over next month, an official said Wednesday. Macri narrowly won Argentina's presidential election Sunday. In the run up to take over from incumbent President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner, the president-elect has named several former businessmen who were deeply critical of the outgoing president's interventionist policies to key cabinet positions.

The new government, which is due to take office December 10, will also create an energy and mining ministry to be headed by Juan Jose Aranguren, former CEO of Shell Argentina, future Cabinet Chief Marcos Peña told reporters.

The former Buenos Aires City Bank chief Federico Sturzenegger, a lawmaker from Macri's right-wing PRO party, will be Central Bank head if Alejandro Vanoli steps down, Peña said. Macri economic adviser Rogelio Frigerio will become Interior Minister (whose priniciapl function is overseeing federal revenue sharing), while Francisco Cabrera, the head of a think-tank linked to the party of the incoming president, will become production minister.

Macri, who leads the center-right "Let's Change" alliance, has pledged to open up the country's economy and end more than a decade of free-spending leftist populism and lift protectionist trade and currency controls in Latin America's third largest economy following 12-year rule by Kirchner and her late husband.

The president-elect has also said he plans to reduce the power of the current economy ministry to diversify decision-making, with the finance minister playing a key role in a newly-formed economic cabinet comprising six ministries. He, however, faces huge challenges in doing so. The Central Bank is running low on dollars, the peso currency is overvalued, inflation is in double digits, and the fiscal deficit (6-7% of GDP) is widening sharply.

Prat-Gay said Wednesday that Macri's government plans to present a package of new laws to Congress in its first week. "The president-elect has said he wants them to be lifted as soon as possible and we're working toward that," he said. The Front for Victory (FpV) party to whom President Fernández de Kirchner belongs retained overall control of both houses.

At: http://www.bignewsnetwork.com/news/238900741/argentine-president-elect-names-ex-jp-morgan-executive-as-finance-minister
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It's also worth mentioning that the qualification Macri has touted most about Prat-Gay, his 2002-04 stint as President of the Central Bank, was notable for his having shelved an ongoing investigation into the US$26 billion wired from Argentina by numerous banks and businesses days before the infamous December 2001 account freeze.

And there's more: http://www.democraticunderground.com/110845605

*Thank you, as well, to think, for posting this story in an earlier comment. Well written, and pretty neutral compared to the fluff being put out by big media on Macri and his gang. http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1108&pid=45598