For an Argentine company, the question of how to pay someone abroad used to have a grim answer. For over a decade, the cepo cambiario made accessing dollars to send out of the country a bureaucratic ordeal, when it was possible at all.
That changed in 2025, and it changed the calculation for hiring in the US.
But it changed partway, not completely, and it changed on top of an economy still running high inflation and a managed exchange rate. So the honest version for 2026 is: moving money out of Argentina to fund a US company is far more possible than it was two years ago, still carries more friction and more uncertainty than it does from Mexico or Colombia, and sits on ground that is still shifting.
Which is the strongest argument in this whole discussion for not funding a US company at all if you can avoid it. And to hire an American, you can.
The Post-Cepo Reality: What Actually Changed
Since April 2025, under Communication A 8226 from the Banco Central, most of the currency controls that defined Argentine business for years have been lifted. The practical effects for a company:
Businesses can now access the official exchange market to buy dollars without the old quantitative limits and waiting periods. Companies can repatriate profits and, importantly, can access foreign currency to pay for services and to fund investment, subject to the rules for flows accrued after 1 January 2025. The official, MEP, and parallel rates have converged to within a few percent of each other, which means the arbitrage games that used to distort every cross-border transaction have largely ended.
For funding a US entity, this is the difference between "nearly impossible" and "doable with advice." An Argentine company can now, in most cases, legitimately access dollars through the banking system to capitalize a foreign subsidiary in a way it simply could not before 2025.
What Has Not Changed, and Why It Still Argues for Caution
The liberalization is real but partial, and this is the part that matters for a company making a multi-year decision.
Some restrictions remain. Dividends and certain flows accrued before 1 January 2025 still cannot move freely through the banking system. Repayment of some related-party financial debt remains restricted. The framework has carve-outs, and it has been adjusted more than once since April 2025, including a partial reinstatement of limits for individuals later that year. Argentina is far from the free capital movement it had in 2015 to 2019, and the direction of policy depends on a stabilization program and an electoral cycle that are both still in motion.
Then there is inflation. Even with the cepo gone, Argentina runs inflation that changes the peso cost of everything month to month. Committing pesos to a fixed foreign investment, and running the ongoing compliance of a foreign entity, is a different kind of exposure in an economy where the currency is still finding its level.
None of this makes funding a US entity a bad idea. It makes it a decision that needs current advice, because "the rules in 2026" is a sentence with a short shelf life in Argentina. Which is exactly why the lighter-touch route is worth understanding first.
You Do Not Need a US Company to Hire an American
Employing someone in the US means US payroll, federal and state tax withholding, US benefits, and a W-2 at year end. None of that runs through an Argentine payroll system, and the IRS does not accept an Argentine parent as a reason to skip it.
But the legal employer does not have to be a company you own. Three routes, and only one involves incorporating and moving capital out of Argentina.
Using an Employer of Record
An Employer of Record is a US company that employs your hire on your behalf. It runs their payroll, withholds federal and state tax, files with the IRS and the state, enrolls them in health cover and benefits, and holds the legal employment relationship. Your team directs the work. On paper, the EOR is the employer.
You pay salary, employer-side taxes, and a per-employee fee. No US incorporation, no capital investment sent abroad, no exposure to the parts of the FX framework that are still unsettled.
This matters more from Argentina than from almost anywhere. Paying an EOR is a service payment, which is among the flows most clearly permitted under the post-cepo rules, rather than an outbound capital investment that has to navigate the parts of the framework still in flux. You get an American on payroll in days without betting on where Argentine capital rules land next year.
This fits a company hiring one to fifteen Americans that wants them working quickly. It fits less well once twenty or more people sit in one state and the US has become a permanent base, since the fee then starts to lose to your own entity.
The trade is that the EOR sits between you and the employment relationship. Contract changes, terminations, and unusual benefits requests route through them.
Setting Up Your Own US Entity
You incorporate, usually a Delaware LLC or C-corp, get an Employer Identification Number, open US banking, register as an employer in each state where someone lives, build payroll, and appoint a US accountant.
The US incorporation is fast and cheap: a Delaware LLC files in about a day and the EIN issues quickly for under $100. The US-side cost sits in everything after: state-by-state registration, multi-state payroll, federal and state filings, and benefits administration, running $5,000 to $40,000 all-in depending on how many states you touch. The Argentine side is the variable one, funding the entity means accessing the official market for the capital transfer under the current rules, which is far more feasible than pre-2025 but still worth confirming transaction by transaction with your bank and counsel.
Worth doing when the US is a committed long-term market, headcount in one state is heading past ten or fifteen, and you are confident enough in the capital framework to commit to a foreign entity. If you already run payroll in more than one country, the US mechanics will feel familiar.
One thing to rule out early: a US PEO is not a substitute for an EOR here. A PEO works on co-employment and assumes you already own the US entity. With no US company, a PEO has nothing to work alongside. An EOR does the whole job.
Engaging a Contractor
A contractor arrangement is fast and cheap, and legitimate when the relationship genuinely is contracting: their own hours, their own equipment, other clients, invoices for deliverables, their own tax. You collect a Form W-9, pay invoices, and issue a 1099 at year end.
It stops being legitimate when the person is a full-time employee in all but name: exclusive to you, on your schedule, on your systems, reporting to your manager. The IRS applies one test and states apply their own, with California's ABC test treating most full-time workers as employees whatever the contract says. Argentine companies know this risk well from the principio de primacía de la realidad, where the facts of the relationship override the contract label, and from the country's history of reclassification claims. US law reaches the same conclusion by its own route.
One Country, Fifty Rulebooks
Argentina runs a national labor law, the Ley de Contrato de Trabajo, applied across the provinces. The US does not. Employment is regulated at the state level as well as the federal level, and the states diverge sharply.
Your engineer in California sits under different tax, wage, overtime, and leave rules than your salesperson in Texas. Hire a third person in New York and you now hold three sets of employer registrations, three state tax regimes, three unemployment insurance accounts, and in some states a separate paid-family-leave contribution.
Incorporating does not solve this. A Delaware entity makes you a US employer; it does not register you in the states where your people live. You file in each one either way, so a US team that looks small on a headcount chart can carry a wide compliance footprint.
What a US Hire Costs
Here the comparison runs in an unusual direction, because Argentine employment costs are high and, crucially, priced in a currency that moves.
US employer-side FICA is 7.65% of wages, made up of 6.2% Social Security up to the annual wage cap and 1.45% Medicare, with federal unemployment adding a small amount per head. Set against Argentina's employer contributions to the social security and health systems, the aguinaldo, and the country's notably high firing costs, the US statutory burden is lighter. And it comes with something Argentine payroll cannot offer: cost predictability. A US salary and its employer taxes are denominated in dollars and do not reprice with inflation the way a peso payroll does.
The state layer is where US costs become variable rather than high. Unemployment insurance carries a different rate and wage base in every state, several states add disability or paid-leave contributions, and workers' compensation is mandatory almost everywhere and priced by role and location.
Health insurance is the cost with no direct Argentine public equivalent. There is no US national system funded by employer contributions the way the obra social system works in Argentina. American candidates in professional roles expect employer-sponsored medical cover as a baseline, and for a small team it can be one of the larger budget lines. An EOR provides group rates an Argentine company with three US employees could not secure alone.
If you use an EOR, add the fee. Ours is $579 per employee per month, flat, with no deposit and no pre-funding, and denominated in dollars so it does not move with the peso. Some providers hold a deposit worth a month of salary or charge a percentage of payroll, so ask for the full structure rather than the headline rate. It also helps to compare what a hire costs across countries before you fix where the role sits.
The Clock Is Barely a Factor
Argentina shares the regional advantage that makes hiring in the US so much easier than hiring into it from Asia or Europe.
Buenos Aires runs one to two hours ahead of US Eastern time depending on the season. An Argentine company hiring on the US East Coast shares almost the entire working day with its American employee, and even the US West Coast, four to five hours behind, stays inside a workable window. There is no night shift and no async-only workaround.
Companies hiring into the US from Asia design their whole operation around a gap of twelve hours or more. From Argentina, as across Latin America, the overlap is the default. For a country with a large, well-educated, English-strong professional workforce already doing significant remote work for US companies, that time-zone fit makes running a US team feel like an extension of the home operation rather than a distant outpost.
What Surprises Argentine Employers
At-will employment. Most US states let either side end the relationship at any time, with no statutory notice and no severance. After the Argentine framework, where dismissal without cause triggers a substantial statutory indemnity based on tenure, this is a striking reversal. Argentine firing costs are among the highest in the region; US at-will employment is close to the opposite. Notice and severance in the US are things you write into a contract, not protections that apply by default.
No aguinaldo, no statutory indemnity structure. None of the Argentine statutory framework carries over. There is no mandatory sueldo anual complementario and no tenure-based indemnity on termination. Your statutory obligations are far lighter, but American candidates expect health cover and often a 401(k) instead, so the money reappears as market-rate benefits.
Costs stay put. This is the one Argentine employers notice most. A US payroll denominated in dollars does not reprice with inflation, does not require paritarias-driven mid-year adjustments, and does not move between the day you budget it and the day you pay it. For a finance team used to planning around Argentine inflation, a stable dollar cost base is a genuine operational relief.
A US salesperson can create a tax question. If someone in the US is concluding contracts on your company's behalf, it can create a taxable presence there, separate from any employment matter. Raise it with your tax adviser before the first large deal, not after.
A Sequence That Works
Start on an EOR for the first hires. It keeps you out of the outbound-capital question entirely, which in Argentina's still-evolving framework is worth more than in almost any other country. It needs no incorporation and puts someone on payroll in days. If the US market does not develop, or if the capital rules shift again, you end a service agreement rather than unwinding a foreign company.
Incorporate once several things line up: the US is a committed market, one state is past roughly ten people, and you are confident enough in the current capital framework to commit pesos to a foreign entity. Given how recently the rules changed and how much still depends on the stabilization program, that confidence is worth being deliberate about. Then run the entity for the concentrated team and keep scattered remote employees on the EOR.
Use contractors only where the work is genuinely independent. A full-time role labeled as contracting costs more than it saves once a US state disagrees with the label.
If you are past the route decision and comparing providers, our breakdown of EOR providers operating in the United States covers pricing, onboarding speed, and compliance coverage across twelve platforms.
Frequently Asked Questions
Can an Argentine Company Hire a US Employee Without a US Entity?
Yes. An Employer of Record employs the person through its own US entity and handles federal and state payroll, tax withholding, benefits, and compliance while your team directs the work. Incorporating is the alternative, and while the post-2025 easing of currency controls has made funding a foreign entity far more feasible than before, using an EOR avoids the outbound-capital question entirely, which still carries more uncertainty in Argentina than in most countries.
Can Argentine Companies Now Send Money Abroad to Fund a US Entity?
Largely yes, following the April 2025 removal of most cepo cambiario controls. Companies can access the official exchange market to fund investments and repatriate profits accrued after 1 January 2025, though some restrictions on older flows and certain related-party debt remain, and the framework is still evolving. Confirm the current position with your bank and counsel before any capital transfer, since the rules have changed more than once since 2025.
Can We Pay a US Employee From Our Argentine Payroll?
No. Someone working in the US is employed under US federal and state law, with US tax withholding, FICA, and US benefits. An Argentine payroll system cannot produce a W-2 or remit to the IRS, and paying a full-time worker by invoice risks reclassification, back taxes, and penalties in whichever state they live in.
How Much Should We Budget Above Salary for a US Hire?
Employer-side FICA is 7.65%, plus state unemployment and workers' compensation, which vary by state. That is lighter than Argentina's employer contributions and far below its termination costs. A major advantage for Argentine employers is that a US salary is denominated in dollars and does not reprice with inflation. Add either an EOR fee or the setup and ongoing cost of a US entity, which starts around $5,000 and reaches $40,000 depending on state coverage.
Does the Time Difference Make a US Hire From Argentina Difficult?
No. Buenos Aires sits one to two hours ahead of US Eastern time, so an Argentine company shares almost a full working day with an East Coast hire, and the West Coast stays within a workable window. This is a far easier fit than hiring into the US from Asia or Europe.
Does Our US Hire Need a Visa?
Not if they are a US citizen or already authorized to work in the US and are staying there. You are employing an American where they already live, so no immigration process applies. Sponsorship only arises if you relocate someone into the US, which is a separate exercise.
