Argentina Markets: Merval & the Peso — August 1, 2026
Key Facts
- The Merval, Argentina’s main stock index, slipped 0.41% to 3,291,323 points as traders banked recent profits in top financial shares.
- The peso strengthened 0.27% against the US dollar, closing at 1,485 per dollar. The pair still trades within about 1% of its 52-week high, which means the peso remains near its weakest level of the year, reflecting tight currency controls.
- Energy firm YPF bucked the downtrend and rose 1.9%, driven by high turnover as investors continued betting on deregulation of the oil sector.
- Grupo Galicia shares fell 1.6% to lead the most-traded domestic names, suggesting a natural pause after a long rally linked to President Milei’s reform push.
- Cross-listed US tech giants dominated volumes, led by Amazon’s 15.7% surge, but their moves reflected a strong US earnings tape, not local Argentine fundamentals.
Today’s Focus
Argentina’s stock market paused for breath on Friday. The Merval index shed 0.41% to close at 3,291,323 points, as a sell-off in heavyweight financial shares dominated the local tape. The peso, however, edged 0.27% stronger against the US dollar to finish at 1,485.
The session was a tug-of-war between energy bulls and bank bears. Investors continued chasing gains in YPF and other oil names on hopes the Milei government will soon fully deregulate crude markets. But they also sold recent winners like Grupo Galicia, which had rallied hard on the broader ‘Milei reform trade’ throughout the year.
Trading volumes told the real story. Foreign cross-listed giants like Amazon and Microsoft saw the highest turnover on the Buenos Aires exchange, heavily outperforming any local company. This means the global rally in US tech was the primary force driving activity, while domestic stocks experienced a quiet, mildly negative profit-taking session.
What matters today. Profit-taking in bank shares masked sustained energy optimism, leaving the Merval slightly lower in a session steered more by Wall Street tech flows than local news.
01 The session in one read
Argentina’s stock market ended Friday on a slightly defensive note. The Merval index, which tracks the largest firms trading on the Buenos Aires stock exchange, fell 0.41% to settle at 3,291,323 points, handing back part of Thursday’s 2.22% surge to 3,304,918. The decline was entirely driven by investors deciding to cash in profits on some of the year’s most beloved bank stocks.
At the same time, the Argentine peso showed a bit of muscle. The official exchange rate closed at 1,485 pesos per US dollar, a small gain of 0.27% for the local currency. It was a mixed bag that tells a clear story: the rally built on President Javier Milei’s pro-market reforms is maturing, and investors are now being pickier about which sectors to back.
Trading was unusually busy, but not because of domestic news. The day’s most-traded instruments were not Argentine companies at all, but local listings of US giants like Amazon and Apple. Their wild swings—Amazon shot up 15.7% after its earnings report—dominated the exchange’s computer screens and likely pulled some attention, and capital, away from local shares.
The -0.41% move does not signal panic or a change in trend. The declines were concentrated in banks that have already posted extraordinary gains in 2026; the selling looks like textbook portfolio rebalancing at month-end. Meanwhile, energy stocks—the other pillar of the local reform narrative—continued to attract buyers. For the bulls, this is a constructive rotation. The variable to watch is whether financial selling accelerates into Monday, which could signal deeper exhaustion with the government’s slow-going economic overhaul, or stabilises as a one-day event.
02 The day’s numbers
| Measure | Level | Change | Read |
|---|---|---|---|
| Merval index | 3,291,323 | −0.41% | One-day pause; profit-taking led by banks |
| USD/ARS (official peso) | 1,485 | −0.27% | Just 1.0% below its 52-week peak of 1,500 |
| 52-week range (ARS) | 1,292 – 1,500 | — | Peso has traded in a very tight managed band |
| S&P 500 (US benchmark) | 7,490 | +0.70% | At 1.6% below its own 52-week high, a strong day |
The peso’s firmness is the session’s hidden message. The currency is still holding within a whisper of its weakest level in a year – at 1,485 it sits just 1.0% below the 1,500 top of its 52-week range – a direct result of the central bank’s rigid crawling-peg policy that only allows tiny daily depreciations. For a foreign investor holding Argentine shares in dollar terms, that slow and predictable grind is a quiet but crucial source of stability.
The US benchmark S&P 500’s solid 0.70% rise to 7,490 points provided a friendly global atmosphere. With the ‘risk-on’ switch firmly on abroad, Argentina’s mild dip looks especially like an isolated, internal decision to bank some coins rather than any broader emerging-market anxiety. Rio Times · Live Market Intelligence
Live Market IntelligenceArgentina — Live Market Board
Argentina — Live Market Board
Instrument Last Change YoY Prev. High Low Volume
MERVAL
3,028,871
-1.65%
+30.51%
3,022,485
3,042,365
2,991,150
—
USD/ARS
1,493
+0.10%
+12.96%
1,491
1,494
1,480
—
YPF
7,810
+0.26%
+72.84%
7,790
7,850
7,600
1,763,858
GGAL
6,980
-0.78%
+1.82%
7,035
7,115
6,920
1,564,062
PAMPA
5,115
+0.69%
+26.70%
5,080
5,140
5,000
721,190
TXAR
747.50
-2.35%
+18.67%
765.50
770.00
742.50
771,892
ALUAR
938.00
-1.21%
+29.83%
949.50
951.00
932.50
135,426
TGS
8,870
-0.17%
+15.05%
8,885
9,075
8,720
143,546
CEPU
2,156
+1.84%
+28.36%
2,117
2,165
2,086
404,146
MIRGOR
1,650
-1.20%
-92.90%
1,670
1,670
1,635
20,877
COME
40.93
-0.73%
-30.47%
41.23
41.60
40.50
4,258,884
LOMA NEGRA
3,130
+0.08%
+5.80%
3,128
3,205
3,090
182,992
BYMA
275.00
-1.70%
+35.14%
279.75
282.50
272.00
1,409,575
TELECOM ARG
4,233
-0.70%
+55.19%
4,263
4,335
4,160
31,896
GLOBANT
38.10
-2.26%
-49.65%
38.98
38.70
36.77
793,552
MERCADOLIBRE
1,870
-3.59%
-20.71%
1,940
1,927
1,870
329,640
03 Why it moved — profit-taking meets energy optimism
The Merval’s drop has a clear villain and a clear hero. The villains were the top private banks, Grupo Galicia and Banco Macro, which have been the absolute superstars of President Milei’s reform trade. These lenders have often doubled or tripled in value over the past year on bets that economic liberalisation would reignite credit growth. On Friday, that trade simply took a breather.
Grupo Galicia shares fell 1.6%, making it the biggest single anchor on the index and one of the highest-turnover domestic names at US$11 million in volume. There was no bad news; it was just a classic case of month-end book-squaring, where fund managers sell their winners to lock in performance.
The heroes were the energy producers. YPF, the state-controlled oil and gas giant, rose a solid 1.9% with the day’s best domestic turnover at US$8 million. Transportadora de Gas del Sur, a key natural gas pipeline company, jumped 2.4% to lead all gainers. Investors are clearly betting that the government’s plan to let oil and fuel prices float freely will enormously boost revenues for these firms, outweighing the short-term profit-taking elsewhere. The same deregulation thread runs through Milei’s capital markets reform opening Argentina to bond issuance and the US$9.7 billion Vicuna copper project approved under the RIGI incentive regime.
04 The day’s movers
| Driver | Level / Move | Change | Note |
|---|---|---|---|
| Amazon (cross-listed CEDEAR) | — | +15.7% | Day’s top volume (US$15m); responded to a strong US earnings report, not Argentine news. |
| Grupo Galicia (GGAL, local bank) | — | −1.6% | Heaviest-traded local stock (US$11m); classic profit-taking on a big reform winner. |
| YPF (YPFD, energy) | — | +1.9% | Highest domestic energy turnover (US$8m); deregulation hopes keep it bid. |
| Transport. Gas del Sur (TGSU2) | — | +2.4% | Topped local gainers; natural gas pipeline firm riding energy deregulation bets. |
| Cresud (CRES, agriculture) | — | −2.2% | The day’s worst local loser; a mild pullback in the farm giant. |
The table confirms the session was a tale of two markets. The real liquidity and fireworks were in cross-listed US tech trackers known as CEDEARs. Amazon’s 15.7% post-earnings rocket was the whole story on the volume front, dragging Microsoft and others with it. For an analyst, this means the ‘Argentine market’ today was largely a proxy for Wall Street’s technology sector.
Stripping away the US noise, the local scene was a gentle rotation. Money moved out of the banks—Grupo Galicia’s 1.6% slip on high volume is a clear red flag for short-term momentum—and moved straight into the energy patch. The 2.4% pop in the gas transporter TGS shows the conviction behind energy deregulation is alive and kicking, promising a more balanced market going forward.
05 The regional scoreboard
| Index | Country | Change |
|---|---|---|
| Merval | Argentina | −0.41% |
| Ibovespa | Brazil | +0.47% |
| IPC | Mexico | −0.58% |
| IPSA | Chile | −0.13% |
| COLCAP | Colombia | +2.12% |
Argentina found itself in the middle of a fragmented Latin American pack. Colombia’s COLCAP was the star of the region, jumping 2.12% in a powerful rally. Brazil’s Ibovespa also clocked a respectable 0.47% gain, lifted by a 13.3% jump in Santander Brasil units. Argentina’s mild loss meant it underperformed the two regional outperformers.
Mexico’s IPC index suffered the region’s steepest drop, down 0.58% to 66,936, and Chile’s IPSA barely moved. The lack of a single, regional direction reinforces that these were all homegrown, idiosyncratic sessions. For Argentina, local politics and position-squaring ruled the day, isolating the Merval from the gains seen in Bogotá and São Paulo.
06 The technical picture
The Merval’s pullback to 3,291,323 looks orderly on a chart. After a tremendous run-up for the majority of 2026, a digit-dropping sell-off did not materialise; instead, the market ticked down in a tightly controlled fashion. Technically, the index is building a flag, slowly digesting its gains through time rather than through a painful drop in price.
The peso is an even more striking picture of control. At 1,485 per US dollar, it is hugging the weak end of a 52-week range that stretches from 1,292 to 1,500 – the higher the number, the fewer US dollars each peso buys. A clean break below 1,480 on sustained volume would be technically significant, signalling real foreign confidence in Argentina’s managed exchange rate. For now, the chart says calm: the currency is sleepy, and the stock index is pausing to catch its breath after a long run higher.
07 What to watch
- Bank profit-taking: Will the selling in Grupo Galicia and Banco Macro accelerate on Monday, or was it a one-day month-end flush?
- Energy momentum: Keep an eye on YPF and TGS. Continued buying without the help of bank stocks would confirm a broad and healthy rotation.
- Peso’s tight range: If the USD/ARS moves decisively towards the 1,500 ceiling or breaks below 1,480, it would signal a major shift in capital-flow assumptions.
- US tech proxy flows: Watch Amazon and Apple CEDEAR turnover. Their dominance shows that global, not local, catalysts now drive Buenos Aires daily activity.
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Frequently Asked Questions
Why did Argentina’s Merval fall on Friday, July 31, 2026?
The Merval slipped 0.41% to 3,291,323 points because investors took profits in the bank shares that had led 2026’s rally. Grupo Galicia fell 1.6% and Banco Macro also retreated in month-end book-squaring. Energy names moved the other way, with YPF up 1.9%, so the decline reflected rotation between sectors rather than broad selling of Argentine risk.
Is the Argentine peso at 1,485 per US dollar strong or weak?
At 1,485 per US dollar the peso sits near the weakest end of its 52-week range of 1,292 to 1,500, just 1.0% from that ceiling. It gained 0.27% on the day, but that is a move inside a tightly managed crawling peg rather than a market-driven rally. A higher number means each peso buys fewer US dollars.
What is a CEDEAR, and why did Amazon dominate Buenos Aires trading?
A CEDEAR is an Argentine depositary receipt that lets local savers buy foreign shares such as Amazon or Apple in pesos. On Friday the Amazon CEDEAR jumped 15.7% on a strong US earnings report and topped turnover at US$15 million. Those moves track Wall Street and the implicit exchange rate, not Argentine corporate fundamentals.
Which Argentine stocks led the gains on July 31, 2026?
Transportadora de Gas del Sur topped the local board with a 2.4% rise, and state-controlled oil producer YPF added 1.9% on the heaviest domestic energy turnover at US$8 million. Both trades rest on expectations that the Milei government will let fuel and energy prices float freely. Farm group Cresud was the weakest local name, down 2.2%.
Sources: BYMA (Bolsas y Mercados Argentinos), Banco Central de la Republica Argentina
This article was produced by The Rio Times’ automated newsroom system. How we use AI · Report an error
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