For the first time, President Javier Milei set a specific date for lifting Argentine currency controls: January 1, 2026. He added that controls could be removed even “faster” if his government reaches a new deal with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and receives disbursements in 2025.

“On January 1, 2026, there will be no more cepo,” Milei said in an interview with LN+ news channel, referencing the term with which currency controls are known. 

The government and the IMF are currently negotiating a new deal. A technical mission from the Fund was in Buenos Aires for a week in late January to meet with Argentine authorities. In a short statement issued at the end of the mission, the IMF called talks “highly constructive and productive.”

According to Milei, the elimination of the currency controls will depend on “what the program’s structure ends up looking like” and “how disbursements are allocated.”

In early January, Milei said in an interview with El Observador that his administration would need US$11 billion to lift the controls.

Economy Minister Luis Caputo and Milei met with IMF Director Kristalina Georgieva in Washington days before the technical staff’s visit, after which she said the fund wanted to “work expeditiously on a new program.” 

Before that, the Fund had highlighted in a report that Argentina needs to remove exchange controls, increase exchange rate flexibility, maintain positive interest rates, and introduce automatic tariff adjustments.

Doubling down on hate speech

Milei also used the interview to double down on the homophobic and transphobic comments he made during his speech at the 2025 World Economic Forum in Davos. Despite claiming that his speech was manipulated, he went on to repeat the same ideas almost verbatim, calling gender-affirming care in children “mutilation” and connecting the LGBTQIA+ community with “gender ideology” and pedophilia.

According to the Trans Journalists Association, “gender ideology” is a term used by anti-trans commentators to imply that trans people are imposing an agenda by their mere existence.

Milei dismissed the importance of the anti-fascist, anti-racist pride march that took place on Saturday to protest his statements. He said it was a march that united all “anti-Milei” sectors, referencing the political opposition and labor unions, calling the gathering “a sign of weakness.”

He also said public trans employment quotas are “wrong” because it is “positive discrimination” and akin to an “absolutist society.”

“If you want to self perceive as a seal and turn into a seal, I have no issue with that. What I think is wrong is when you believe I have to pay the bills for that.”