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AmericasFebruary 3 2004

Driven by confidence and conscience

Alfonso Prat-Gay, Argentina’s central bank governor, talks to Karina Robinson about his plans for recapitalising the ailing financial system.In the run up to my meeting with 38-year-old Alfonso Prat-Gay, governor of the Central Bank of Argentina, I had met 16 top businessmen, bankers and economists who were uniformly charming and informative. So I feared for the famed trait of Argentine arrogance (the classic joke told to me by a host of locals is: How can you make a lot of money? Buy an Argentine for what you know he is worth and sell him for what he thinks he is worth). It was with a sigh of relief, then, that I encountered Mr Prat-Gay, who has that famed trait in spades.
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“We must forget the frequently used clichés of international experiences and look at Argentina for what it is,” he says. Although this is in reference to a new norm from the central bank, which instructs banks to set aside the same amount of capital for loans to individuals, companies, the state and others, it is emblematic of his attitude towards many foreign concepts.

Placing the blame

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