Venezuela Currency Devaluation forces the first Sovereign Crypto Currency

Cafe con Leche Index

Total News - 8/19/2018 - Atlanta, GA - Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduras announced Friday a massive devaluation of the existing currency, while making a verbal peg 1 "Petro" (Venezuelas new CryptoCurrency which is not yet in circulation) to $60 US Dollars, effectively wiping out the value of the existing currency and forcing the population to use the Petro.

Crypto Enthusiasts will be eager to see the Petro trade, as it will be the first sovereign Crypto Currency in the world.  IBM has disclosed that it is contracted with more than 10+ central banks to investigate the possibility of making digital sovereign currencies based on cryptographic technologies like Blockchain, but it hasn't disclosed who they are.  Venezuela is an interesting case to be the guinea pig in this digital money experiment, because Venezuela has been a unique host of an underground mining community in the past years, because electricity there is practically free.  The interesting world of underground Bitcoin mining in Venezuela has been covered in an excellent article published on Hacker Noon "Extortion, Police Raids and Secrecy: Inside The Venezuelan Bitcoin Mining World."

Maduro told viewers:

"As of next Monday, Venezuela will have a second accounting unit based on the price, the value of the Petro. It will be a second accounting unit of the Republic and will begin operations as a mandatory accounting unit of our PDVSA oil industry."

What's interesting about Venezuela is that this is an act of desperation, Maduro really has few other choices.  Venezuela has become a war zone in recent years with rolling blackouts, rampant inflation, food shortages, rise in violent crimes, and social unrest.  The Petro is Venezuela's oil backed (government backed) Sovereign Crypto Currency, based on the NEM Blockchain.  But ultimately, it is backed by whatever Maduro says it is backed by, as any fiat currency is.  In fact the word 'fiat' means 'by decree' or in plain English, because I said so.  

Fiat: a formal authorization or proposition; a decree.

From Zero Hedge:

Maduro said the new currency, set to enter circulation on Monday, will be called the "sovereign bolivar" and will be based on the petro, which is valued at $60 or 3,600 sovereign bolivars, after the redenomination planned for August 20 slashes five zeroes off the national currency. The minimum wage will be set at half that, 1,800 sovereign bolivars. The government would cover the minimum wage increase at small and medium-size companies for 90 days, Maduro added. It was not clear what happens after.  "They've dollarized our prices. I am petrolizing salaries and petrolizing prices," Maduro explained in a Friday televised address. "We are going to convert the petro into the reference that pegs the entire economy's movements."

We will see the market reaction shortly, however Venezuela is already living in a world of it's own, even bragging about how the IMF doesn't have any 'fingers in our pies' type of speech.  Meanwhile, the population of Venezuela is forced to turn to things like Bitcoin and Alt coins in order to survive, as the national currency is completely unstable.

https://portal.totalcryptos.com/news/venezuela-currency-devaluation-forces-the-first-sovereign-crypto-currency

Venezuela Default Countdown Begins: After Selling Billions In Gold, Caracas Raids $467 Million In IMF Reserves

In late October, when describing Venezuela's desperate steps to keep itself afloat for a few more months, we reported that in order to fund $3.5 billion bond payments in early November, Maduro's government had engaged in something that is the very definition of insanity: selling the country's sovereign (and pateiently repatriated by his deceased predecessor) gold to repay creditors.

Specifically, in the past several months, Caracas has quietly parted with 19% of its gold holdings: "Central bank financial statements posted this week on its website show monetary gold totaled 91.41 billion bolivars in January and 74.14 billion bolivars in May.  At the strongest official exchange rate of 6.3 bolivars per U.S. dollar, which the bank uses for its financial statements, that decline would be equivalent to $2.74 billion."

But while ridiculous, Venezuela's decision to liquidate some of its gold is perhaps understandable under the circumstances: Venezulea relies on crude oil for 95% of its export revenue, and with prices refusing to rebound, the only question is when do all those CDS which price in a Venezuela default finally get paid.

What is even more understandable is what Venezuela should have done in the first place before dumping a fifth of its gold, but got to do eventually, namely raiding all of the IMF capital held under its name in a special SDR reserve account.

Recall that this is precisely what Greece did in July when everyone was speculating when it would default. Now its Venezuela's turn.

The details: Reuters reports that Venezuela withdrew some $467 million from an IMF holding account in October, according to information posted on the fund's web-site, as the OPEC nation seeks to improve the liquidity of its reserves amid low oil prices and a severe recession.

Venezuela holds part of its reserves with the International Monetary Fund in an instrument called Special Drawing Rights (SDR), a basket of international currencies made up of the euro, Japanese yen, pound sterling and U.S. dollar.

The withdrawal will allow Venezuela to use the funds for imports or debt service, but does not change its total reserve holdings as SDRs are already accounted for.

Needless to say, it is far wiser to use up all paper "assets" to repay "paper" liabilities, before resorting to hart money. By then, it is usually game over anyway, so our advise to Mr. Maduro: just default now, and save your gold.

Referentially, the country's international reserves as of Thursday stood at $14.819 billion: and dropping fast.  At this rate of depletion, we give Venezuela a few more months before the army takes over.

Finally, the central bank's most recent financial statements as of May, showed that 58% of reserves were held in gold.  It is unclear how much, if any, were held in "toilet paper".

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2015-11-09/venezuela-default-countdown-begins-after-selling-billions-gold-caracas-raids-467-mil

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