Here lies the most delicate risk for the ruling party: that a portion of the population does not perceive real improvements in their daily lives, even if the major fiscal figures show order. In the coming days, the market will watch three things with a magnifying glass: if food prices ease at the month's end, how much the utilities chapter ends up contributing, and if the Government can sustain the currency anchor without straining rates or liquidity. The latest LCR survey recorded food with a rise above 3% in the last four weeks, pushed by basics like meats and vegetables, while Eco Go reported weekly increases that, when annualized, leave a month that will hardly drop below 2.7% in food and projects a general inflation around 3%. With adjustments already officialized for February, public utilities push the regulated sector again and create a drag effect on other costs (transport, maintenance, logistics, and household expenses). In the same vein, Analytica showed measurements pointing to a February close to 2.8% and Consumidores Libres reflected a basket with increases that, in the first half of the month, were already above 3%. The contrast that worries the market is that these figures move away from the Central Bank's Market Expectations Survey (REM), where several analysts were estimating a “calmer” February, around 2.1%. It is a key data point because it shows that the “hard core” of daily consumption—food—continues to set the pulse of the wallet, even in a scheme of fiscal surplus and without monetary issuance, the two pillars that the ruling party presents as its main anchor. In February, consultancies again found that same dynamic. In January, INDEC reported a monthly rise of 2.9% and a year-on-year increase of 32.4%, with Food and non-alcoholic beverages as the sector with the highest increase (4.7%). If this trend is confirmed, the Government would close the first two-month period with a rate of increases still far from President Javier Milei's promise, who had stated that inflation could fall below 1% at the beginning of the second half, a goal that today appears under tension. The start of 2026 already came with mixed signals. Journalistic reports on resolutions and tariff frameworks reflected increases in electricity and gas that, depending on the scheme and area, hit unevenly but are felt in the shopping basket. For the Government, the problem is not just February's number: it is the sequence. If these projections are confirmed, it would complete a semester with an upward monthly curve, even with fiscal discipline and a foreign exchange policy aimed at containing the currency. Economically, because inflation that does not recede at the promised pace tends to overheat wage negotiations, disrupt expectations, and make the bridge to recovery more fragile. On the street, inflation is not experienced as a statistic but as a sum of micro-shocks. In other words: the picture shown by high-frequency prices is ahead of what consensus expected, and that gap is usually paid for with more coverage, more doubts, and less patience. Added to the pressure from food is a component difficult to hide: tariffs. In that fine balance, more than a tenth is at stake: the credibility of the disinflation path that Milei made the heart of his political contract is at stake. This opens a political and economic dilemma at the same time. Political, because the ruling party's central narrative rests on the slowdown in inflation as “proof” of its course. Different private measurements detected pressure on food and a “floor” that is increasingly firm in regulated prices, particularly due to updates in public utilities. Buenos Aires - February 25, 2026 - Total News Agency - TNA - February's inflation threatens to move again in an uncomfortable band—between 2.5% and 3%—and complicates the official objective of breaking the 2% mark in the first quarter. If food prices rise and services are updated, many households feel that “everything is moving” even when the dollar remains relatively stable.
