The president of the Central Bank of the Argentine Republic, Miguel Pesce, asked the head of government of the City of Buenos Aires, Horacio Rodríguez Larreta, to desist from the intention to apply a tax to a monetary policy instrument, aimed at achieving monetary, financial and exchange rate stability, and reminded him that the Supreme Court of Justice has jurisprudence on the impossibility of the districts to advance on the BCRA’s regulations.
In a letter sent today, Pesce said: “I find myself in the need to request that you kindly arbitrate the necessary measures in order to prevent tax actions that distort the policies carried out by the Central Bank of the Argentine Republic, through the implementation of the instruments that are legally provided for in order to achieve monetary stability. financial and foreign exchange laws, which, in accordance with Article 3 of its Organic Charter, are erected as basic premises of its functions and purpose.”
It considered that “it is imperative to emphasize that the powers of the City in terms of generating resources should in no way be considered as unlimited” and recalled that “the tax design, and the subsequent execution of the provisions that are finally approved, impose the unavoidable need not to affect the exercise of the purposes and functions that have been attributed to the Central Bank of the Argentine Republic in the referenced aspects”.
Pesce recalled that the Supreme Court of Justice of the Nation held that the legislative acts of the respective jurisdictions cannot advance on aspects that concern the management of the regulation normatively delegated by the National Congress to the Central Bank. The Court ruled in the case “Banco Credicoop Cooperativo Limitada c/Entre Ríos, Provincia de s/Acción declarativa de certeza” in a ruling of March 26, 2014. “The responsibilities that are typical of the specialty of this Central Bank of the Argentine Republic according to its Organic Charter, should not be affected or distorted by provisions such as those that would arise from the approval” of the Buenos Aires tax proposal, Pesce said.
The president of the Central Bank finally called on the head of government of the City to “arbitrate the means at his disposal to prevent the realization of any action that distorts, hinders or results in conflict with the policies carried out by the Institution that I preside, since if such precautions are not observed, irreparable damage will be consummated in the execution of monetary and financial policy at the national level.”
