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By Eliana Raszewski
BUENOS AIRES (Reuters) -Argentina will post a budget surplus in April for the fourth consecutive month under the new government, the country's economy chief said Wednesday, touting the trend as a reflection of stronger finances in the midst of an economic slump.
In an interview, Economy Minister Luis Caputo told local broadcaster La Nacion+ he expects "some" fiscal surplus once official data is released for April, but did not go into further detail.
The government of libertarian President Javier Milei, who took office last December, achieved a first quarter surplus of some 275 billion pesos ($311 million) in March. The quarterly budget surplus was the first of its kind since 2008.
Milei blames decades of government overspending as the main culprit for the country's galloping inflation rate, which in April landed at nearly 290%.
"We've been in fiscal balance for four months, April is already in fiscal balance, with some financial surplus," said Caputo. He stressed that the government has not sought any private sector financing, and that it also has not entered into a new debt program with the International Monetary Fund (IMF), but he said talks with the lender will begin shortly.
"We're just going to start talking now," he said.
Milei inherited a severe economic crisis including the threat that South America's second-biggest economy could tip into hyperinflation, a dire scenario the libertarian leader has promised to prevent.
Argentina's annual rate of rising consumer prices reached 211% last year, and in separate remarks earlier on Wednesday Milei's cabinet chief Nicolas Posse estimated that inflation would dip to about 140% by the end of this year.
Speaking to lawmakers, Posse added that the central bank will allow the local peso currency, which was devalued by 50% late last year, to weaken by 2% per month, to reach an exchange rate of 1,016 pesos per U.S. dollar by December.
($1 = 885.5000 Argentine pesos)
(Reporting by Eliana Raszewski; Writing by David Alire Garcia; Editing by Valentine Hilaire and Shri Navaratnam)
