Investments in Argentina posted their eighth consecutive year-over-year decline in June, as the accumulated drop in the first half of 2026 compared with the same period last year was 7.6%.
This data comes from a survey conducted by Orlando Ferreres & Asociados. The consulting firm’s Monthly Gross Domestic Investment Index (in Spanish, IBIM) was 6.2% lower than a year ago. Compared to the previous month, the index contracted by 0.4%, an extension of the “sawtooth” pattern of alternating rebounds and declines.
Compared to June 2025, the worst figures were seen in the durable production equipment segment. For domestically produced goods, the decline was 9.5%, while for imported goods, the figure showed a 12.7% drop.
The exception was investment in construction, which showed a slight improvement of 0.4% compared to June 2025.
“As we reach the midpoint of the current year, investment continues to hover at very low levels, and there are still no clear signs pointing to a recovery, although certain specific sectors posted better figures in the sixth month of the year. Construction managed to return to positive territory, and we also saw slight increases in heavy commercial vehicle registration figures,” the report stated.
The consulting firm’s seasonally adjusted data showed that June’s investment was the third-lowest since October 2024, surpassed only by April of this year and November of last year.
Looking ahead, while the firm does not foresee a scenario that would allow for a sustained rebound, it expects “the contraction in investment to continue slowing.”
“The factor that could change this slow trend is the investments announced under the RIGI program, but deadlines and timelines for these investments are flexible and subject to some discretion,” the report concluded.
Doubts about the RIGI effects
The figures show that investment is far from being one of the drivers of economic activity at present, as the government claims.
On the contrary, improvements in GDP have been driven by exports and private consumption. Better records for the latter are linked to methodological issues regarding how INDEC measures this variable.
According to the latest official data, investment fell 11% year-over-year in the first quarter of 2026, marking its fourth consecutive decline on a seasonally adjusted basis. Furthermore, think tank Fundar noted that investment accounted for just 14.3% of GDP — a “historic low” and “far below the necessary 25%.”
Regarding the potential RIGI contributions, the organization maintained that the investment regime is a response to a “real problem” — namely, the low level of investment the country was attracting heading into 2023 — but that it is “poorly designed.”
They pointed out “two serious problems”: the “excessive benefits granted to sectors that did not need them because they were already investing,” such as mining and energy; and the lack of a strategy aimed at creating linkages between the most dynamic sectors and other activities that could serve as suppliers.
For Misión Productiva, a network of professionals with experience in both the public and private sectors, the negative trend in investment can be explained by five factors: weak demand and dwindling wages, the standstill in public works, the poor performance of private construction, the lack of credit and policies to support investment, and uncertainty regarding the future sustainability of the economic model.
“Current growth, supported mainly by agriculture, mining, and energy, is insufficient to generate broad-based investment across the economy as a whole, which jeopardizes the country’s sustained growth,” the report added.
Based on these figures, per capita investment stood 21.8% below the 2018 record, set prior to the currency crisis that marked the beginning of the end of Mauricio Macri’s administration.
Emiliano Libman, a researcher at Fundar and the Center for Studies on State and Society (CEDES), told Herald sister publication Ámbito that the sectors in which RIGI projects are concentrated represent “too small a fraction of total investment to drive the overall figure.”
“It might help stop the decline in investment, but I don’t expect a rebound in the short term,” he added.
Originally published in Ámbito
