Economy Minister Luis Caputo said dollarization in Argentina is “off the table” following the announcement that the United States would give the country a currency swap line and directly intervene in the local forex market by buying pesos.

“Dollarization could be an alternative, but for now it is off the table,” Caputo said on Sunday night in an interview with LN+ news channel after returning from his week-long stay in Washington. “At this moment, we don’t have enough dollars to guarantee a successful dollarization.”

The economy minister added that Bessent’s office “is willing to keep buying pesos, financial dollars, future dollars, and bonds” in the Argentine forex market. 

“All instruments are on the table.”

Caputo also said that the current swap agreement with China stands in place despite the tensions between Washington and Beijing. In an interview with Fox News, Bessent recently said that President Javier Milei is “committed to getting China out of Argentina.” China responded by saying that some U.S. officials have a “Cold War mentality,” and questioned their “interventionist” agenda.

In late September, Bessent announced that the U.S. was “ready” to purchase Argentine bonds, “prepared to deliver significant stand-by credit” through the Exchange Stabilization Fund, and was negotiating a US$20 billion swap line. The move was widely interpreted as a bailout. Last week, the U.S. first bought pesos in the Argentine market as part of the negotiations.

The government had been depleting its scarce international reserves in recent weeks after markets raised doubts over the sustainability of its economic plan. According to Caputo, the exchange rate policy “will remain exactly the same,” even after the October 26 national legislative elections. 

“The band scheme will continue, and the exchange rate will float between them,” he said. “The International Monetary Fund is not forcing us to do anything. We decide the exchange rate policy.”

In April, after striking a new deal with the International Monetary Fund (IMF), Argentina adopted a currency band scheme that allows the U.S. dollar to float between two values, originally AR$1,000 to AR$1,400. The Central Bank buys or sells dollars to manage the exchange rate if it reaches these limits.

Caputo also ruled out the possibility of a devaluation after the elections, as well as a convertibilidad plan. The name is in reference to an economic plan that was in force in Argentina between 1991 and 2002 that pegged the Argentine peso one-to-one to the U.S. dollar. 

The minister described Bessent’s announcements as “the most important economic news” he can remember, and said that the United States is not asking for anything in return. Rather, he said, the Trump administration decided to move in this direction because of the “political and economic alignment” between the US and Argentina.

In the next hours Caputo will return to Washington with President Milei for a meeting with President Donald Trump at the White House on Tuesday in order to ratify their alliance and economic agreements. An economic announcement is expected after the bilateral meeting.

You may also be interested in: Scott Bessent: US ‘giving Argentina a swap line, not putting money in’