The nickname for Argentina’s 2001 withdrawal restrictions was the Corralito.
The term described emergency measures introduced in December 2001 that limited cash withdrawals from bank accounts. The restrictions were intended to stop a rapid run on banks and protect Argentina’s currency-board system, but they trapped depositors’ savings and provoked intense public anger. Demonstrations, including the banging of pots and pans known as cacerolazos, spread through the country.
The Corralito formed part of a much broader crisis involving recession, heavy public debt, falling confidence, and the eventual end of the peso’s one-to-one convertibility with the U.S. dollar. It should not be confused with the 1994 Mexican crisis, commonly called the Tequila Crisis. Corralito literally refers to a small enclosure and became shorthand for the banking restrictions.