1🧵 soooo WTF is going on with the Pesos in Argentina?? even many locals struggle to understand what's going on. here ALL you only need to know as a visitor 👇

2🧵 1) blue market - which is very roughly crypto dollar rate, p2p, cueva etc. the best you can get, the free market rate. @joinpeanut allows you to tap into this rate. example rate from oct 31: you got 1470 pesos for $1. 2) tourist / foreign card rate. this closely tracks MEP + card fees + slow settlement discount (can take 14 days here, so it gets priced in). example rate: 1370 pesos for $1 (a competitive crypto card popular with locals), that's $7 lost on every $100 spend! and that's a good card. a bad one could be $25 on $100 spent.

3🧵 why is this? using a stablecoin card does not do anything in terms of efficiency. you are effectively selling USDC/USDT for USD and that gets sold for pesos. if you use @joinpeanut you're selling USDC for pesos directly so you get access to the cripto dolar rate. CARDS CANNOT DO THIS! crypto cards will lose you $5-25 on every $100 spend here. this includes cards that are popular with locals. they are just clever with marketing.

4🧵 other rates - for your curiosity - include: oficial (artificial gov peg, used for intl trade, accounting, taxes) which is approx to dolar tarjeta. MEP (which is derived from selling pesos bonds in dollars), CCL (approx MEP but if you sell the bonds abroad), blue (this is cash rate on blue market, p2p exchange etc, cripto dolar (the rate of stablecoins, both p2p and through CEXes).