This editor’s note highlights the key facts and market implications behind “The ‘Dollar Factory’: Argentina’s Second Half – “, with emphasis on sourcing, product fit, fabrication, logistics, or buyer impact.
Argentina's foreign trade has entered a new phase. Specialist Marcelo Elizondo anticipates growth in purchases during the second half of the year, but also a new historical peak for Argentine external sales.
Fragmentation of international trade, friendshoring, "connector countries," disruptive innovation. New terms in the dictionary of a world transforming under new geopolitical conditions, in which international trade is also being reconfigured, but without stopping its growth.
On this challenging board, international business expert Marcelo Elizondo gave an optimistic view of Argentina's external sector to members of the Córdoba Foreign Trade Chamber (Cacec), though not without risks and challenges.
Marcelo Bechara, president of Cacec, summarized the context in which local companies seek to board that train: "An opening of the economy at unusual speeds and with high competitive pressure," he said when introducing the speaker.
"In 2025, Argentina had the second-highest export level in its history. But this year it will surpass that: it will set a historical record. This was already seen in the first quarter. I estimate that exports will exceed US$ 95 billion this year," Elizondo began. Last year, that figure rounded to US$ 87.077 billion.
“The exports are going to exceed US$ 95 billion in this year,” estimated Elizondo before Cacec members.
Exchange rate stability that allows for longer-term planning, the weakness of the domestic market, greater global demand for Argentina's main products, and the growth of mining and energy are, in the expert's words, the main causes of the export boom.
FIRST QUARTER
Between January and March, Argentine exports grew 17% and exceeded US$ 21.5 billion, while imports fell 7%.
As Elizondo described in detail, Argentina "is recovering lost ground" in terms of exports and imports.
He ranked the export complexes that, due to their high potential, will continue to be the engine this year: agribusiness, energy, mining, knowledge economy, and regional economies.
NEW MAP
"The fragmentation of world trade coincides with a company-level revolution driven by technology. This is expressed, for example, in the fact that investment in intangibles is much greater than that destined for tangibles," Elizondo analyzed before Cacec partners.
The current value of the dollar, for its part, is not an obstacle: "The exchange rate is supposed to be lagging, but the first quarter had record sales. So far, it is not seen that this 'lag' generates a lower ceiling for exports," he explained.
More Imports with Surplus
Elizondo made it clear that this growth will continue to have import growth as a necessary correlate; beyond a weaker performance in this first quarter, due to the weakness of the domestic market.
“If investment grows, and it will, imports will grow. This year, in the second half they will grow even more than in the first. It will not be at the pace of 2025, because that was extraordinary and is explained by the low base of 2024. I believe there will be a trade surplus of US$ 10 billion,” he anticipated.
From that reasoning, he considered the economic opening process positive, although he clarified that the pending task for the national State is "to develop capabilities to detect illegal imports: dumping, distortions, and others. They are practices penalized by the World Trade Organization that can be combated," he said.
Emphatically, he urged companies to complement production with imports. He cited an international study conducted a couple of years ago that reveals that 25% of world exports are imports, meaning they contain that share of inputs, parts, etc.
For Argentina, the percentage was only 7%. "The lowest in the world along with Saudi Arabia's," he emphasized.
The Lowest Export Ratio in Latin America
"What Argentina is doing is recovering lost ground. It still has a lot ahead. If it exported enough to achieve Latin America's exports-to-GDP ratio, it would do so at a figure 69% higher. If goods trade was US$ 87 billion in 2025; it should be at least US$ 147 billion," he contextualized.
Elizondo highlighted the free trade agreements signed by the country as very positive and considered them key to continue boosting its exports. The individual agreement with the United States, meanwhile, implies strengthening the relationship with the world's largest importer and the planet's main foreign direct investor. Although it involves tariffs, Elizondo highlighted that it allows their elimination on 1,800 tariff lines and a ceiling of 10% for the rest. In his view, the national government is focused on four axes of work: achieving macro order, stabilization, deregulation, and opening.
"It does not deal with the mesoeconomy, that is, the immediate environment of companies," he indicated. In that territory, he invited sectoral chambers and provincial governments to work to accompany SMEs in the internationalization process.
