The Short Version
In short: Your LatAm expat and nomad daily guide for Sunday, August 23. The Colombian peso is at its strongest in almost seven years, which is very good news if you are paid in pesos and a real pay cut if you are not. Argentina’s country risk hit a three-month high. And Buenos Aires is in the middle of a free tango festival that runs to the end of the month.
The peso, at a seven-year high. Colombia’s official rate is 3,048.12 to the dollar for this weekend, down 2.57 percent against the rate a week earlier and the strongest since October 2018. On a US$3,000 monthly transfer that is about US$80 of purchasing power gone in five days.
The tax reform still is not filed. The De La Espriella government has confirmed September. Reporting this week suggests it will leave headline corporate rates alone but strip exemptions and widen the filing base — which would pull more residents, foreigners included, into declaring.
Argentina’s risk premium moved, the peso did not. Country risk hit a three-month high of 532 basis points at Thursday’s close, then fell almost 5 percent on Friday to around 505, breaking a fourteen-session run-up. It is still up more than 20 percent over August. The wholesale dollar rose 0.34 percent on the week.
