Ines Lanusse: I can check that information for you and send it, if that’s okay. I don’t have it in front of me, but it’s an important number, the amount of checking accounts. Let me check. Let me — if it’s okay with you, I can find the information and send it back to you, if that’s okay. Let me check here. I have some information, wait — more or less the non-remunerated checking account is around ARS376 billion, and the remunerated around ARS260 billion. But let me check those figures and send it back to you, if that’s okay.
Carlos Gomez: Thank you so much.
Operator: The next question comes from Josefina Jimenez of [indiscernible]. Please go ahead.
Unidentified Analyst: Thank you for this opportunity to ask a question. We’re curious, how might dollarization affect the Bank’s financial results? It would be very helpful if you give us some guidance about that. According to, at least from what we can glean, your net monetary assets at the end of 2Q amounted to approximately ARS1 trillion. But that net monetary position led to a loss from income from net monetary position of ARS48 billion in 3Q. So if dollarization is placed into effect, how — what might we expect? Should this type of loss from net monetary position be erased when dollarization is in place, because there will be no more indexation? We would appreciate your comments on this, please. Thank you.
Ines Lanusse: Hello. Nice to hear from you back again. Okay, regarding dollarization, as you know, Milei just was elected last Sunday. Honestly, we’re not seeing dollarization as a possibility, nor this year, nor the following year. And there is still a lot of information to be disclosed when the President assumes and when he sees what he can do or what he can’t do. So we’re not seeing dollarization as a possibility. Being that said, as I mentioned before, the way in which we protect our equity to reduce the effect of inflation is by both — two factors. The real estate that protects our equity and the CER bonds and the dual bonds that have increased our protection of equity to around 100% of the equity as of the fourth quarter of this year. So that’s the way we have all the financial system to protect the equity of the bank. But again, dollarization is not something that we see as a possibility in 2024.
Unidentified Analyst: And if I may have a follow-up question, could you share with us, the Bank’s outlook for inflation hereon without, let’s say, if dollarization in fact does not occur in 2024, what sort of inflation outlook can you share with us?
Ines Lanusse: Yeah, the figures that our research department is seeing today, now that Argentina changes practically every day, but we are projecting our year-end inflation around 200% for 2023 and for 2024 around 156% — 155%, sorry. Being this said, you have to think that what our research department is seeing is that in the first month of 2024, probably you’re going to have a much higher inflation. So, the average inflation should be higher than 2023 during the — or 2024. But year end, it should be less. It would be 155% compared to 200% year-end of 2023. The other variable that our research department is projecting is the monetary policy rate that is projecting to end 2023 around 144%, little bit higher than the 133% that we have today, and moving towards the year-end of 2024 at around 56%. So, it’s negative in real terms, what we’re seeing for next year.
Unidentified Analyst: Could you repeat that last point, you lost me on this negative…
Ines Lanusse: The monetary policy rate that we are projecting is to end 2023 around 144%, which is a little bit higher than the 133% that we have today and ending 2024 with 56%. This decrease, you should see more towards the end of the first quarter, beginning of the second, when the harvest takes place, and that will represent a negative interest rate in real terms.
Unidentified Analyst: So how would that affect then your financial results? That would be a significant level of negative rates, right, in ’24.
Ines Lanusse: Despite this, we’re still projecting, yes, you could see a decrease in ROEs and ROAs for 2024, but positives in real term. With inflation, that goes from 200% to 155%, but in average, in 2024, it’s going to be higher than the 200%, we are still seeing positive ROEs and ROAs, lower but positive.
Operator: [Operator Instructions] This will conclude the question-and-Answers section. At this time I would like to turn the floor back to Ms. Lanusse for any closing remarks.
Ines Lanusse: Okay, thank you for your time, and let us know if you have further questions. Have a good day.
Operator: Thank you. That concludes today’s presentation. You may disconnect your line at this time and have a nice day.
