Milei heads to Paris to court investment, meet Macron

President Javier Milei will travel to Paris on Tuesday, leading a government delegation for the latest edition of the ‘Argentina Week’ investment roadshow.

Milei will be the star guest at the forum, which seeks to attract investors, though the headline moment of his brief stay in Europe will be a meeting with French President Emmanuel Macron.

The trip comes as Argentina’s economy is showing signs of stagnation, with GDP falling 0.6 percent in the second quarter compared with the previous three-month period.

It also comes a week after Milei slammed Europe as a slave to regulation, immigration and "woke" thinking, saying in an interview with French broadcaster LCI that Europeans disliked his ally, US President Donald Trump, because he tells the "truth about how it is sinking."

Milei, a firebrand libertarian who describes himself as an "anarcho-capitalist", will open the latest edition of the three-day "Argentina Week" investment roadshow on Thursday with a speech at the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD).

Leading a delegation packed with provincial governors and business leaders, Milei will discuss potential investments before holding a private meeting with Macron at the Élysée Palace. 

Macron will later receive the full Argentine delegation participating in Argentina Week, which runs from September 30 to October 2.

On Friday, Milei is due to receive an award from the Paris Economic Forum, which has described him as one of the world's "most influential economists.". Argentina Week is scheduled to close later that day, before Milei returns to Buenos Aires.

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France is Argentina’s seventh-largest foreign investor, with French investment in the country rising 63 percent in 2024, principally in sectors covered by Milei’s RIGI investment incentive, one of his flagship initiatives,

Milei will be accompanied on his trip by 12 provincial governors who have maintained working relationships with his government: Rolando Figueroa (Neuquén), Ignacio Torres (Chubut), Alberto Weretilneck (Río Negro), Claudio Vidal (Santa Cruz), Alfredo Cornejo (Mendoza), Rogelio Frigerio (Entre Ríos), Gustavo Sáenz (Salta), Juan Pablo Valdés (Corrientes), Leandro Zdero (Chaco), Carlos Sadir (Jujuy), Marcelo Orrego (San Juan) and Raúl Jalil (Catamarca). Buenos Aires City Mayor Jorge Macri will also join the delegation, along with representatives of some of Argentina’s largest companies.

The provincial leaders are expected to take an active role in Argentina Week, as some did at the previous edition in New York, where governors participated in thematic investment panels. 

The broader presidential delegation will include Cabinet Chief Diego Santilli, Presidential Chief-of-Staff Karina Milei, Economy Minister Luis Caputo, Foreign Minister Pablo Quirno, Justice Minister Juan Bautista Mahiques and Health Minister Mario Lugones.

Since taking power in December 2023 and taking an axe to government spending, Milei has managed to produce regular budget surpluses and tame the triple-digit inflation rate he inherited, bringing annual inflation down to 33.5 percent.

But nearly three years of austerity have sapped the industrial sector, employment and consumption in Latin America’s third-largest economy.

The trip comes with Milei’s popularity at its lowest point to date, according to recent polling.

Argentina Week is the second investment roadshow of its kind organised by the government, following an event in New York in March.