mcaffa said:
This is extremely disturbing news, as I oftentimes withdraw funds from my Argentine account when I travel abroad.
How on earth do they expect Argentines to travel internationally? With credit cards only? What about people who don't have credit cards? This is absolutely bogus. Grrrr. Viva Cristina.
You can still withdraw funds overseas as long as you can transfer money to your U$S account.
I guess the rational is that if you can afford to travel internationally, you should have sufficient justifiable resources to have or obtain permission to buy dollars, then you can just move what you need into your U$S account.
Right or wrong, this really just brings ATM withdrawals into line with the same restrictions that exist for other methods (cash, wire transfer, etc).
It's surely designed not so much to stop outbound tourists as to stop people collecting their rent or other earnings abroad (see the communication A5295 that comes with this one).
If you're a tourist, you can buy your dollars before you leave in the parallel market, just at a cost of around 8% -- which is about the same cost of withdrawing your daily ATM limit from an Argentine bank overseas after you take into account the exchange margin plus the ATM fees at both sides. In the end, it's pretty much a wash, or maybe even a little cheaper if you travel to a non-USD using country.
On the upside, at least you can still use your credit card (and settle your transactions when you get back here in pesos) because in that case, you're acquiring a debt in a foreign currency, not buying that currency.