Mercedes Marcó del Pont

Mercedes Marcó del Pont (born 28 August 1957) is an Argentine economist and politician who was President of the Central Bank of Argentina. She has also served as a member of the National Chamber of Deputies, as head of the Federal Public Income Administration, and as Secretary of Strategic Affairs in the Presidency of Argentina under Alberto Fernandez.

Early life and career Mercedes Marcó del Pont was born and raised in Barrio Norte, Buenos Aires. The Marcó del Pont family first arrived in what today is Argentina in 1785 from Catalonia, and became prominent in commerce. She took an interest in politics in her teens, and became affiliated with the centrist Integration and Development Movement (MID), a party whose platform focused on support for import substitution industrialization and foreign direct investment. She enrolled at the University of Buenos Aires, and earned a degree in Economics in 1982. She joined CLACSO, the Latin American Social Sciences Council, in 1984, and was a teaching assistant at her alma mater's School of Economics, and taught a specialized course in the discipline for members of the Sanitation Workers' Federation in 1985. She was accepted as a Master's Degree candidate at Yale University's Economic Growth Center, and earned her postgraduate in International and Development Economics in 1987.

Returning to Argentina, she was a senior researcher for the Development Research Foundation (FIDE), a think tank founded by Octavio Frigerio (son of the late MID leader, Rogelio Julio Frigerio, and Marcó de Pont's cousin). in 2004.

Political career Marcó del Pont was elected to the Lower House of Congress on the Front for Victory (FPV) ticket in the 2005 mid-term elections. She seconded Education Minister Daniel Filmus on the federal district's FPV party list for elections to the Senate in 2007; in an otherwise banner year, the FPV was defeated in that race, however. Marcó del Pont was named President of the Central Bank of Argentina on February 3.

Upon the election of Alberto Fernández as President of Argentina in 2019, she was appointed as head of the Administración Federal de Ingresos Públicos, Argentina's federal tax administration. In 2022, she was appointed Secretary of Strategic Affairs in the Presidential Office, succeeding Gustavo Béliz.

Personal life Marcó del Pont married Jorge Cafferata, a prominent local psychiatrist, and had three children. Teaching at the National University of Lomas de Zamora between 1999 and 2002, she joined developmentalist economist Aldo Ferrer and other University of Buenos Aires academics in Plan Fénix, which advocated a more balanced globalization.