Argentina's Milei targets monetary policy shift after reform bill win

By Jorge Otaola

BUENOS AIRES (Reuters) -Argentina's President Javier Milei will turn his attention to monetary policy reform after scoring his first major legislative win in Congress, the libertarian leader said on Friday.

Milei, in an interview with local broadcaster LN+, said the passing of his sprawling economic reform package in the early hours of Friday after months of debate would help stabilize the economy, boost growth, and lay foundation for more reforms.

The economist and former pundit has pledged to undo myriad currency controls that stymie business and trade, though needs to dig the country out of an economic recession and rebuild depleted foreign currency reserves to be able to do so.

He wants to keep lowering interest rates and cut monetary emission to bring down triple-digit inflation, inherited when he took office in December. He has already managed to overturn a deep fiscal deficit with tough austerity measures.

"The zero deficit stage has already passed, now we are going to the zero emission stage. The change of monetary regime is coming," Milei said in the interview, adding the economy would start to stabilize in "phase 2" of his economic plan.

"That will mean a recovering level of activity, an improvement in employment, an improvement in salaries, of pensions, lower interest rates, and the return of credit."

As part of the next phase in Milei's economic plan, the central bank will stop issuing pesos to pay down interest on certain debts, Economy Minister Luis Caputo said later on Friday.

Caputo said the government was "turning off the tap" on the issuing pesos, which he said would provide more economic certainty and stability and would ease concerns about when restrictions on the currency exchange would be lifted.

(Reporting by Jorge Otaola; Writing by David Alire; Editing by Franklin Paul and Diane Craft)