Martín Genesio, CEO of AES Argentina, the local subsidiary of AES Corporation, a global power company, summed up Argentina's electricity sector in a single word at the AmCham Summit 2026 in Buenos Aires: deregulation. "If there are market-friendly rules, investment follows," he said at the summit, organized by the American Chamber of Commerce in Argentina (AmCham) at the Buenos Aires Convention Center.
His panel — alongside Daniel Ketchibachian of Aeropuertos Argentina, the concession operator of the country's main airports; Roberto Nobile of Personal, Argentina's leading mobile telecom operator; and Facundo Gómez Minujin, CEO of JP Morgan Argentina — addressed the link between the power sector's regulatory shift and the infrastructure demands of emerging industries.
"The electricity sector was heavily regulated and subject to state intervention for the last 10 to 15 years," Genesio said. "There is now a clear deregulation agenda — and that agenda is enabling investment and improving sector efficiency." The administration of President Javier Milei has placed energy market liberalization at the center of its industrial policy.
AES Argentina's near-term plan is to double wind capacity at the Vientos Bonarenses wind farm in Bahía Blanca, Buenos Aires province. The company is also targeting two growth markets for expanded clean power supply: mining and data centers. "We want to bring data centers to Argentina," Genesio said — a natural extension of AES Corporation's U.S. positioning, where the company supplies renewable power to Google, Meta, and Microsoft.
"Deregulation is unlocking present investments — still somewhat modest — and above all future investments, which will be very necessary for the infrastructure that other sectors need to develop," he said. His assessment of mining was precise: the sector does not lack resources — it lacks the power and logistics infrastructure to develop them at scale.
Genesio conditioned the positive outlook on regulatory continuity: "What needs to happen for this to work is that there is a plan that doesn't change — that the regulatory policy and the plans put in place are maintained over time."