Starting a business in Argentina: foreigner's guide (2026)

IGJ General Resolution 5/2025 authorizes existing SA, SAS, SRL and other company types to transform into the lightly-regulated 'Section IV' company of Law 19.550, easing exit from formal corporate burdens after 50+ years of restrictions. It reflects the post-Ley Bases push to simplify and deregulate company formation.

The Inspección General de Justicia replaced its decade-old company-registry regime (RG 7/2015) with a streamlined framework that cut bureaucratic requirements for incorporating and registering companies; it took effect 1 November 2024. The reform aims to speed registration and facilitate foreign investment.

Congress passed Law 27,742 ('Law of Bases and Starting Points for the Liberty of Argentines'), published July 8, 2024. Title VII creates the Régimen de Incentivo para Grandes Inversiones (RIGI), offering investors committing ≥USD 200 million a fixed 25% corporate tax, import/export exemptions, and 30 years of regulatory stability across mining, energy, technology, and other sectors — the most significant large-project entry framework since the 1990s.

Milei's flagship 'Ley de Bases y Puntos de Partida para la Libertad de los Argentinos' declared a public emergency, delegated deregulatory powers to the Executive, modernized labor rules, and created the Large Investment Incentive Regime (RIGI). It anchors the legal mandate for the wave of business-formation deregulation that followed.

The IGJ repealed the restrictive resolutions that had hampered the Simplified Joint-Stock Company (SAS) and restored a fast, low-cost incorporation path, including a new official signature-authentication system. This reversed the 2020 clampdown and made the SAS again the easiest vehicle to start a business.

President Milei's 366-article emergency decree repealed or amended over 300 laws to deregulate the economy, declaring economic public emergency through end-2025 and removing many controls on commerce and contracts. It set the deregulatory direction later channeled into company-registry reforms.

The IGJ imposed mandatory professional pre-qualification opinions on nearly all SAS filings and asserted power to demand higher minimum capital, sharply raising the cost and friction of forming a SAS in the City of Buenos Aires. These restrictions stood until repealed in 2024.

Argentine federal courts granted a precautionary injunction suspending IGJ General Resolutions 5, 6, 9, 17, 20, 22, and 23 of 2020, which had restricted SAS digital formation and eliminated online bookkeeping, following a lawsuit by ASEA (Asociación de Emprendedores de Argentina). The ruling checked the Fernández government's attempt to roll back the 2017 entrepreneur-friendly framework and confirmed that administrative bodies cannot unilaterally nullify statutory rights created by Congress.

IGJ inspector general Ricardo Nissen issued RG 6/2020 under the newly inaugurated Fernández administration, suspending digital SAS incorporation via TAD for 180 days and eliminating digital accounting books — requiring reversion to in-person, paper-based processes. The measure effectively dismantled the 24-hour online company formation mechanism created by Ley 27349, drawing immediate condemnation from Argentina's entrepreneurial community.

President Macri's DNU 27/2018 grouped 170 reforms across eight ministries, amending or repealing approximately 140 laws and decrees. Key business-entry measures included eliminating mandatory licensing in multiple sectors, granting legal equivalence to digital files, and accelerating brand and patent registration — building on the SAS framework enacted the prior year and pushing Argentina's overall World Bank Doing Business score higher in 2018–2019.

Congress approved the Ley de Apoyo al Capital Emprendedor (published April 12, 2017), creating the Sociedad por Acciones Simplificada (SAS) — a corporate vehicle formable by a single person, entirely online, in under 24 hours via the TAD platform. The SAS bypassed the multi-step, notary-intensive process required for traditional SAs and SRLs and also established Argentina's first crowdfunding regulatory framework, marking the country's most ambitious pro-startup reform.

The Entrepreneurial Capital Support Law introduced the SAS — a single-shareholder-capable company that can be incorporated digitally, in as little as 24 hours, with model bylaws — alongside crowdfunding and venture-capital incentives. It was the landmark modernization of how businesses are formed in Argentina; IGJ RG 6/2017 supplied its operating rules.

The new Code overhauled Law 19.550, renaming it the General Companies Law and reforming 'Section IV' so that informal or non-typical companies and single-member SA structures gained clearer legal standing. It reshaped the baseline options available to anyone starting a business.

Argentina's foundational corporate statute established the regime of company types — SA, SRL, partnerships — and the principle of typicality that governed business formation for half a century. It remains the backbone of company law, amended repeatedly through the recent deregulation drive.