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Banking Credit Card real-world rate "MEP" transaction repo (Dec2023)

it is a huge time suck waiting at the store.
if you can get home delivery/envio then it's nice. only Disco/Jumbo/Cencosud (one location) will deliver to me where i'm at, and stuff my dog eats like Beef Heart isn't sold online, though it is in-store. so, even less selection. but without a car, lugging everything in a backpack (especially liters of milk and beer) ain't worth saving 1000 Pesos to deliver, plus a couple bucks in driver tip, twice a week to get fresh veggies/meat.

This fake milk drives me crazy. How can a country as big as Argentina with so many cows not have an abundance of fresh milk???
all these cows, and no milk. my favorite satchets are Manfrey 1L fresh whole milk (3%), when i can find them. lowest was 600 Pesos last week, sometimes the Casanto brand is 950 Pesos, and the Serenisma expensive brand with the cow pictures on it is 1200-1500 Pesos. when milk is cheaper in the UK than water, it leads me to believe that there are some MAJOR barriers to efficiency in Argentina with dairy. and i've NEVER seen raw milk sold anywhere, even health food stores. i also hope this will change with deregulation.

Still some things are crazy expensive. Like good toilet paper and bread is also expensive here which seems crazy.
help everyone out and refuse to pay for them! as long as people are buying the cheaper brands or only on-sale stuff, the prices will go down. most people aren't interested in changing their habits even a little, since food is still pretty cheap overall, but i try to 'vote with my dollar' ... so when Andes one-liter beers are 1700 Pesos i buy a bunch, and when they are 2500 Pesos i drink Quilmes, Imperial, etc. instead.

Many of her friends seemingly don't really have a good high paying job yet they all live in nice places but their parents pay for it. That seems common here.
yes, earlyretirement has mentioned the 'generational wealth' aspect of Argentina. families seem to be VERY connected with their members, and everything works in little mini-tribes just like it probably always has in history. very different from the USA where most average people are expected to be self-sufficient and on their own when they're an adult (of course the upper-class families pay for 200k college, co-sign on loans, etc.)

MEP past 2 days, currently around 965


 
if you can get home delivery/envio then it's nice. only Disco/Jumbo/Cencosud (one location) will deliver to me where i'm at, and stuff my dog eats like Beef Heart isn't sold online, though it is in-store. so, even less selection. but without a car, lugging everything in a backpack (especially liters of milk and beer) ain't worth saving 1000 Pesos to deliver, plus a couple bucks in driver tip, twice a week to get fresh veggies/meat.


all these cows, and no milk. my favorite satchets are Manfrey 1L fresh whole milk (3%), when i can find them. lowest was 600 Pesos last week, sometimes the Casanto brand is 950 Pesos, and the Serenisma expensive brand with the cow pictures on it is 1200-1500 Pesos. when milk is cheaper in the UK than water, it leads me to believe that there are some MAJOR barriers to efficiency in Argentina with dairy. and i've NEVER seen raw milk sold anywhere, even health food stores. i also hope this will change with deregulation.


help everyone out and refuse to pay for them! as long as people are buying the cheaper brands or only on-sale stuff, the prices will go down. most people aren't interested in changing their habits even a little, since food is still pretty cheap overall, but i try to 'vote with my dollar' ... so when Andes one-liter beers are 1700 Pesos i buy a bunch, and when they are 2500 Pesos i drink Quilmes, Imperial, etc. instead.


yes, earlyretirement has mentioned the 'generational wealth' aspect of Argentina. families seem to be VERY connected with their members, and everything works in little mini-tribes just like it probably always has in history. very different from the USA where most average people are expected to be self-sufficient and on their own when they're an adult (of course the upper-class families pay for 200k college, co-sign on loans, etc.)

MEP past 2 days, currently around 965


Everone is hoping that things improve with deregulation. I agree if you stop buying, they have no choice but to lower the prices. Keeps happening on many items when they try to raise prices too high. And good to get pushback now on healthcare plans and the government stepping in to say they must roll prices back.

Generational wealth here is like nothing I have ever seen. Many friends here own several properties that the grandparents purchased and then passed on so I have friends living off income from properties they inherited. As you mentioned @StatusNomadicus for the most part in the States you are expected to get off your ass and make something out of your life. Although after covid I see adult kids living in with parents again.
 
And good to get pushback now on healthcare plans and the government stepping in to say they must roll prices back.
if we could get total de-regulation on barriers to entry in fields like health insurance, so many companies would compete for our subscription that we'd have more than 2-4 choices for insurance, and prices/services would be wayyyyy cheaper. imagine if instead of having a handful of phone carriers there were 20. and insurance you could choose from 100 independent companies. this is the way! decentralization, customer-owned collectives, etc.

MEP is 952-953 all weekend:



 
if we could get total de-regulation on barriers to entry in fields like health insurance, so many companies would compete for our subscription that we'd have more than 2-4 choices for insurance, and prices/services would be wayyyyy cheaper. imagine if instead of having a handful of phone carriers there were 20. and insurance you could choose from 100 independent companies. this is the way! decentralization, customer-owned collectives, etc.

MEP is 952-953 all weekend:



Until Milei and his team fix many things, companies won't come. Employment and labor laws here are broken and no companies will want to start until laws are changed.
 
Employment and labor laws here are broken
i'm very surprised immigrating here (legally) hasn't become completely open. this is something i feel like Milei's cabinet could use Executive power to not enforce Migraciones stuff that is hindering economic development and work visas. i was chatting with a nice guy at a print shop in Cordoba today and he was so confused why i'm trying to move here, and he had no idea it was such a pain in the ass to get a temporary 1-year Residency.

MEP going back down, 1007 official and 952 yesterday and today 23Apr202, with Western Union at 1054, worth the extra 1002 Pesos/Dollar still!


 
i'm very surprised immigrating here (legally) hasn't become completely open. this is something i feel like Milei's cabinet could use Executive power to not enforce Migraciones stuff that is hindering economic development and work visas. i was chatting with a nice guy at a print shop in Cordoba today and he was so confused why i'm trying to move here, and he had no idea it was such a pain in the ass to get a temporary 1-year Residency.
Many people come here illegally and there is no penalty. I have been in Argentina many years and I never heard of a case where someone was deported when there wasn't a drug related crime. No one is really enforcing Migraciones stuff. Argentina is the easiest country to stay in forever without worrying about government deporting you.

Many people already think it is as you say it should be @StatusNomadicus. Try overstaying in Brazil and you will see they know how many days you have been in the country and won't allow you to stay more. Argentina is very easy.
 
Many people already think it is as you say it should be @StatusNomadicus. Try overstaying in Brazil and you will see they know how many days you have been in the country and won't allow you to stay more. Argentina is very easy.
no, i said it should be easy to be legal when you're law-abiding and spending money/buying an apartment/offering something to the country. and you haven't seen the overwhelming evidence that has been shared here, that the free-for-all days are gone?

1 https://www.expatsba.com/threads/ap...uld-do-to-you-for-overstaying.1928/post-11682

2 https://www.expatsba.com/threads/is-it-true-that-2-visa-overstays-auto-5-year-ban.1844/post-11861

Argentina isn't very easy for residency, nor is it still guaranteed that you can overstay/border-run unlimited times anymore
 
no, i said it should be easy to be legal when you're law-abiding and spending money/buying an apartment/offering something to the country. and you haven't seen the overwhelming evidence that has been shared here, that the free-for-all days are gone?

1 https://www.expatsba.com/threads/ap...uld-do-to-you-for-overstaying.1928/post-11682

2 https://www.expatsba.com/threads/is-it-true-that-2-visa-overstays-auto-5-year-ban.1844/post-11861

Argentina isn't very easy for residency, nor is it still guaranteed that you can overstay/border-run unlimited times anymore
Exactly. Laws change all the time. It seems like they are getting stricter. My friends lately that have been coming down haven't been able to enter Argentina without showing proof of onward travel out and returning within 90 days. This has never been an issue before but lately they all are being asked to show a return ticket leaving Argentina.

 
It seems like they are getting stricter
i understand trying to stop the flow of people coming in and leeching. but maybe just turn-off the spigot, then let it solve itself? or at least stop the free stuff, then make an actual law so people know what will be enforced. i imagine there are bus-loads of people from S America coming to have a baby or get fake-married in Argentina, but for some reason the current strategy is to screw tourists over about buying expensive same-day onward travel tickets? not a good marketing move (and neither is Milei saying he would support Israel/Ukraine).

on good news:


 
i understand trying to stop the flow of people coming in and leeching. but maybe just turn-off the spigot, then let it solve itself? or at least stop the free stuff, then make an actual law so people know what will be enforced. i imagine there are bus-loads of people from S America coming to have a baby or get fake-married in Argentina, but for some reason the current strategy is to screw tourists over about buying expensive same-day onward travel tickets? not a good marketing move (and neither is Milei saying he would support Israel/Ukraine).
But the way Milei got budget surplus is unsustainable. Just fake smoke and mirrors that can't last.

 
budget surplus is unsustainable. Just fake smoke and mirrors that can't last.
...says you, an economics-illiterate Peronist, based on nothing. oh, and the WSJ OPINION section, written by an O'Grady who has a BA in English and an MBA. she has such stunning 'journalism' like:

1. Milei's plan "engages the country’s 24 governors, many of whom may support him thanks to the honeymoon his government still enjoys with the public." (ah yes, rejecting massive spending on stupid sh*t, as the voters asked for and he said he would do the past 2 years, is a honeymoon. in reality, people who voted for Libertarianism and limited federal government have more attention span than a TikTok video).

2. "Adding insult to injury, the central bank said it plans to decorate the new 20,000-peso note with an image of Juan Bautista Alberdi, father of Argentine classical liberalism and a staunch advocate of sound money. Alberdi died in 1884, but if he were still around I’m betting he’d sue for defamation." (why would it be an insult to give people more than $1 USD bills to use? why can't Argentina both have bigger notes since Peronism wrecked the Peso, and also shoot for Dollarization and the legal usage of all currencies and trade? idiots always frame things in false dichotomies like this)

3. "He backs Israel, a welcome foreign policy" (welcome for war-loving psychos like O'Grady, not for the average Argentine or estadounidense who wants to fix the suffering in their country before giving billions in bombs to Israel and Ukraine, for the current Still-In-The-Cold-War proxy war)

4. "If he doesn’t change course, he could easily turn out to be one more mediocre Argentine president—or worse. Mr. Milei’s government needs stable money, and fast." (oh no, another mediocre president!!! the horror! and has there ever been a president that O'Grady approved of? and no sh*t Argentina needs stable money; that's been the case for 100 years. why make it seem like it's all on Milei's cabinet, and not also on the Ñoqui Deep State? and what would 'changing course' look like, O'Grady and Avocado? use illegal/unconstitutional means to buy a trillion US Dollars and force people to use them in Argentina? as noted all over this forum and real life, Argentina is already Dollarized; everything from cars to houses to cuevas revolves around the USD. what a stupid, says-nothing-and-offers-no-real-plan article, unsurprisingly shared by Avocado who sees headlines and says 'oh good i agree with Milei being bad!!!!')

in summary: adding 20k and 50k Peso notes = bad. because O'Grady says so. and something-something-i-stand-with-Israel's-genocide
 
Let us see what happens by end of this year but don't you see pain and suffering this man is causing my country??!!
I support Milei but I have to admit I am not so sure how things will turn out by the end of this year. If things don't turn around by July he will be done and have a noose around his head. Doesnt matter what Time Magazine says when people can't eat or pay their bills.
 
I am not so sure how things will turn out by the end of this year. If things don't turn around by July
don't worry about the 50% poverty rate that happened under the previous cabinet! it's all Milei's fault, duh! that's an easy answer. /s

this is concern-trolling. turn-around, according to which metrics?

don't you see pain and suffering this man is causing
you're such a tribal piece of sh*t with no basis in reality, always. don't worry about the pain and suffering when peronistas were in-charge; things only matter when 'evil peluca guy' is president. duh! /s

today's MEP:


 
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pattern with WU's rate in relation to blue rate
if you check my twitter, www.x.com/ArgentinaMEP you can see:

the spread of government MEP to actual use cases usually loses losing 71, 72, 74, 72, 62, 62, 73, 37 (random sampling)

the WesternUnion difference from the gov’t MEP is higher by 18, 35, 23, 37, 24, 50, 22, 6 (i didn't track it before March).

on 08Mar2024there was a very close spread of 18 between gov’t MEP and my spends. but sometimes it depends on the time of the day, etc. when banks/gov't update their numbers.

i know at times the WU rate has been below the Blue Dollar and MEP Dollar, but in the past 2 months it's definitely been much higher than what your cards will get you (if you can get the fee waived for WU).
 
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