Credit was the great engine behind the surge in consumption Argentina saw in late 2024 and early 2025.
But from the start of last year, that trend gradually slowed and then reversed entirely, driven by volatile interest rates and a sharp rise in household defaults.
Since then, Javier Milei’s government hasn’t seen any significant improvement in either credit or consumption. That has fed into an uneven recovery, one now concentrated in the energy, mining and farm sectors.
While June had shown a faint recovery in peso lending, the July figures released this week painted a bleak picture once again.
Peso loans fell 1% month-on-month and 1.3% year-on-year, according to estimates by First Capital Group based on Central Bank data.
