On Friday, December 26, the Senate approved, as arrived from Deputies, both the 2026 Budget and the Tax Innocence Law. In the case of the Budget, without listening to their bases, even the radical senators—including Valdés, from Corrientes, who emerged into politics from Franja Morada—approved the definancing of education at all levels of our country, breaking the rule of trying to reach 6% of the annual GDP. This objective was met for the last time in 2015, since between 2017 and 2019 the percentage was reduced to values close to 2.3%, while in 2023 it reached just 3.5%.
During 2025, that percentage ended up being close to 1.5%, because the budget that was used was that of 2023 adjusted for inflation, inflation that between 2024 and 2025 accumulated almost 160%. For 2026, the budgeted number is 0.8%, also eliminating funds for technical education, or what many of us remember as the old CONET.
Also, in conjunction with this, the Tax Innocence Law was approved which, beyond updating the evasion values for natural and legal persons, generates multiple noises. It does not ask questions about the origin of the funds that are incorporated into the financial system; imposes inconsistent fine values on taxpayers throughout the country and will end up generating a drop in collection, but no longer due to a drop in consumption – as has happened since 12/12/2023 – but rather due to the elimination of taxpayers (economic actors) based on bankruptcy requests promoted by the State itself, in order to continue with the “permanent adjustment until the implosion of the State”, as I clarified back in March 2024.
Ignorance of the origin of the funds incorporated into the financial system, even with amounts established as limits, allows the laundering of assets from preceding crimes. That is, to make it better understood: the funds deposited may be the result of robberies, kidnappings and/or drug trafficking and/or arms trafficking. In this context, the least of all is the case of those who have purchased dollars on the black market due to not having authorizations during the different exchange restrictions applied in our country, as a result of the lack of dollars for exports between 2011 and 2015 and/or due to the capital outflow facilitated between 01/15/2016 and 08/31/2019. This scheme was applied again on 09/01/2019 and, for the period 2016-2019, in 2021, the government of Alberto Fernández, through the Anti-Corruption Office, filed a complaint for capital flight for a total of US$ 85,000 million, a cause that Justice decided to shelve and never investigate.
In addition, the Law breaks the international agreement by which our country joined the FATF against money laundering, an agreement that has constitutional status since the 1994 reform, since it was approved by the National Congress. For this reason, we can be excluded from the civilized world and be considered a tax haven, as are, for example, Seychelles, Paraguay and other countries included in the list of 01/02/2018 by Law 27,430. This scenario does not attract any serious or productive investment and leaves us at the mercy of criminals.
On the other hand, although the fines for non-compliance with formal duties – such as failure to submit sworn statements – were completely outdated (currently they are $200 and $400 for individuals and legal entities, respectively), it is not logical that they should be raised to $220,000 and $440,000. Many registered managers do not invoice enough in a month to ensure the rotation of merchandise and the payment of salaries, and the remainder becomes meager. The consequence will be that ARCA will take them to court and, in the event of non-payment by the executive – even with embargoes -, those taxpayers will end up going bankrupt. This will cause a reduction in economic activity throughout the country and, subsequently, an even more abrupt drop in revenue than that generated by the self-inflicted recession and the useless sacrifice to which the population was subjected since 12/12/2023, pushing large sectors into poverty. Poverty that they then try to confuse with cross statements between data from the INDEC, the UCA and the National Council of Social Policies, when the comparisons must always be made on the same indicator, since not all of them measure in the same way.
Returning to the issue of Fiscal Innocence, in tax matters all the Professional Councils in the country sent notes explaining the situation, but, as usual, they were ignored.
During the week, news was also known about the gold reserves of the National State. Given the three requests made by the national deputy Sergio Palazzo and the one made by the General Auditor’s Office of the Nation, Justice demanded this week that it be reported where the 11 tons of gold bullion that were purchased in 2021 by the National State are located. Let us remember that during the months of July and August 2024 it was possible to observe, through the media, how funds from the BCRA itself were transported in trucks to the Ezeiza airport to be loaded on planes of a foreign airline, and their destination was never known again.
Now, both the president of the BCRA and the Minister of Economy must declare where they are and/or at whose request this operation was carried out. The president of the Central Bank has among his functions, stipulated in the Organic Charter modified in 2012, to safeguard the funds intended to sustain the economy. By not doing so, both are in a position to be charged with negligence in the fulfillment of the duties of a public official, embezzlement of public funds (as a euphemism for not saying “choreo”) and integration of an illicit association, crimes that would inevitably land them in jail.
But how does this affect daily life? Very simple: within the gross international reserves are the US$ 4,981 million that gold represents. If we add to that that the price of gold grew almost 5% this week alone, we find that the reserves are not US$ 43,610 million as of Friday the 26th, but rather US$ 37,109 million in real terms, taking the net reserves to more than US$ -23,000 million. Gold whose whereabouts no one knows cannot be counted within the reserves.
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