Argentine President Javier Milei was named "world's most influential economist" by the Paris Economic Forum, delivering an acceptance speech in which he detailed the depth of Argentina's economic crisis at the time he took office and outlined the policy framework his government applied in response.

Milei described inheriting a monetary imbalance he said was double that of 1975 — a crisis that itself produced a sixfold explosion in inflation. He noted the official and parallel exchange rates diverged by 200%, that the Central Bank was insolvent, and that social indicators had fallen below the levels recorded in the lead-up to the 2001 crisis. Inflation was running at a severe rate at the time of his government's assumption of office, with the equivalent of four monetary bases in Central Bank remunerated liabilities maturing daily, generating what he described as a quasi-fiscal deficit of ten points of GDP. An additional ten monetary bases' worth of Treasury debt was also maturing daily, meaning the money supply could theoretically have been multiplied by fifteen in a single day.

Milei said the combined fiscal imbalance — five points of GDP from the Treasury and ten from the Central Bank — amounted to fifteen points of GDP to be addressed. During his campaign, he had carried a chainsaw as a symbol of spending cuts and pledged to close the fiscal gap within one year, a target widely dismissed at the time as unachievable within four. He credited Economy Minister Luis "Toto" Caputo — whom he called "the architect of the miracle" — with reaching fiscal balance in the first month of the administration through a 30% reduction in public spending.

In his remarks, Milei also expressed gratitude for a meeting held prior to the award ceremony with economist Philippe Aghion, describing it as a significant personal privilege. He noted that his own academic specialisation in economic growth was shaped in part by the Neo-Schumpeterian school associated with Aghion, and referenced a frequently cited passage by Robert Lucas Jr. on the consequences of economic growth for human welfare. Milei also mentioned a recent meeting with economist Xavier Sala i Martín as another highlight of the same period.

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