Argentine Economy Set for Transformation as Milei Promises Overhaul of YPF Stock

The election of Javier Milei as President of Argentina has caused shares in state-owned oil company YPF to soar by 40% on Monday, surpassing $14.90 per share just before 2:00 p.m. EST. This increase was prompted by Milei’s plans for a major economic revamp in the country, including privatizing YPF and using the US dollar to revive the economy.

If Milei’s plans come to fruition, it could lead to significant changes in the Argentine economy. Milei wants to add value to companies such as YPF, with the aim of increasing their saleability and benefiting the people of Argentina. The government had previously nationalized 51% of YPF over a decade ago from Spain’s Repsol, but now manages substantial shale gas and oil reserves.

The victory of Milei led to an increase in stock prices for other Argentina-linked equities such as Grupo Financiero Galicia and Banco Macro, as well as a rise in value for the Global X MSCI Argentina ETF. The country’s stocks and dollar bonds also performed well on Monday in response to Milei’s win.

Milei described his victory as a defeat of a decadent model and asserted that there is no turning back from this new economic era. To manage Argentina’s historic inflation, a plan is set to deprioritize the peso over the dollar, which is expected to impact the exchange rate between the two currencies.