Venezuela Sacrifices Drinking Water to Pay Bondholders

Venezuela Sacrifices Drinking Water to Pay Bondholders
Jun 5, 2014 1:54 PM ET
www.bloomberg.com...

At a time when Venezuela’s record $25 billion in arrears to importers has its citizens waiting hours in line to buy drinking water and crossing borders in search of medicine, President Nicolas Maduro is using the nation’s dwindling supply of dollars to enrich bondholders.

Venezuela, which imports just about everything, and its state oil producer have paid $2.8 billion in interest to overseas creditors this year, according to Barclays Plc. Including debt principal, bondholder outlays will balloon to almost $10 billion by year-end, the London-based firm estimates.

By putting off the local companies responsible for supplying everything from diapers to cancer medications, Maduro can preserve access to debt markets and protect oil shipments that would be vulnerable to bondholder seizure, said Alejandro Arreaza, an analyst at Barclays. Even if that means fanning the world’s fastest inflation and inflaming protests over shortages that have left at least 42 people dead since February.

“The government’s priority is to pay the sovereign debt,” Alejandro Arreaza, an analyst at Barclays Plc, said in a telephone interview from New York.

WOW these thieving banksters are getting desperate, this should go over well

originally posted by: Hx3_1963
WOW these thieving banksters are getting desperate, this should go over well

...and yet a large percentage of the western world stands in support of countries taking IMF bailouts or joining the EU to sign up for a spiffy new austerity plan in exchange for a few billion euros. Imbeciles!

This is related to an ongoing problem there...

Massive Global Debt, Financial Crisis and Food Lines in Venezuela
MARCH 12, 2014
truthfed.com...

Food Lines in Venezuela

What will the American people do when those entitlements run out? When their dollars no longer hold any value and they need food for their families? Most Americans are not only oblivious to what’s coming, but they are completely dependent on their luxuries. How would the average American survive if their was a food shortage and you couldn’t simply walk up to your local grocery store and fill your carts with food.

Right now there are huge food lines in Venezuela and people are even having to mark themselves like cattle with markers to hold their spots in lines. Check out what Business Insider recently reported about the food crisis in Venezuela.

It’s hard to get a sense of what a food shortage is like unless you’ve lived through one, but this tidbit from Venezuela serves as a chilling illustration. The lines to get into government supermarkets are so long that people mark their arms with their place in line. It’s not a permanent tattoo — just a pen — but the point is to make sure that the long lines stay as orderly as possible.

Didn't this happen in Argentina in the 80's ?

a reply to: burdman30ott6

I may have understoof everything wrong, but arre you blaming it on bankers?

Correct me if I am wrong,cause i wanna be wrong

a reply to: Hx3_1963

It's been happening all around the world since the word "communism" was pronounced,yet people still want to keep doing these social experiments,no matter how many must die,no matter how many corrupt governments are spawned.Too bad once people fall in love with politicians they can't fall out of it,they will show love even if their stomachs are growling,even if their skin is falling off due to hours standing in line in the sun.

This is all too macabre for anyone who hasn't experienced it to understand. Seeing people defend the rights of those who eat grilled salmon and caviar while you can't find chicken at the supermarket just makes my skin crawl,it's the ultimate mental slavery

This is pretty serious.....and sad. Maybe the US can give them some money since we're so good at giving it away.

This can't be true, only capitalist countries do things like this.
Bbwwahahahaha!

The amount of debt globally has soared more than 40 percent to $100 trillion since the first signs of the financial crisis as governments borrowed to pull their economies out of recession and companies took advantage of record low interest rates.

Bankers Cream-Dream

originally posted by: metodex
a reply to: burdman30ott6



I may have understoof everything wrong, but arre you blaming it on bankers?



Correct me if I am wrong,cause i wanna be wrong

I absolutely am. In the 90s, Venezuela owed a ridiculous amount of foreign debt, mostly directly to the IMF. Chavez put the country through some serious austerity programs to pay that debt off, then made a grand showing of "booting the IMF out" of the country and nationalizing the Venezuelan banks. The problem is the man in charge of their nationalized bank is Nelson Merentes, former Finance minister, a known crook, and IMF representative. There have also been some significant rumors of closed door meetings between the IMF, Venezuela, and China. Merentes denies any meetings with the IMF, but the fact remains that some sort of a banking deal was cut on the world stage to fund Venezuela in exchange for further nationalizing their country (which is a form of austerity).

a reply to: burdman30ott6

I absolutely am. In the 90s, Venezuela owed a ridiculous amount of foreign debt, mostly directly to the IMF. Chavez put the country through some serious austerity programs to pay that debt off

As a Venezuelan I must say you got no idea what you are saying.

Chavez paid nothing it increase the debt during the time Venezuela got more revenue from oil.

They stole $60billions in fake imports after destroying the local production of everything from toilet paper to construction steel, whit the exchange control they impose since 2003.

Just in the last 3 years the government gave away 18bn to Cuba because you know they are "friends".

Please the problem of Venezuela is not capitalism is theft by a corrupt government that wasted more money in 14 years than the rest of the 190ish years the country exist managed.



2013 just when Chavez died $105bn

source (spanish)


Please explain how chavez made "some serious austerity programs" but at the same time the budget increased like this?

a reply to: Indigent

Poorly worded on my part. I was specifically refering to the IMF/World Bank Debt... which CHavez did pay off.
www.bloomberg.com...

Traditionally, national debt is analyzed as a percentage of GDP. The undeniable fact is that Venezuela's debt to GDP ratio is far lower than it was when Chavez too office. It stood in the 40-45% range then, now it is in the mid 20's.

For a truly disturbing concept, consider that the USA currently stands at 101.5% debt to GDP.
www.tradingeconomics.com...
Think the US is boned if (when) the dollar is no longer the global reserve currency?

Don't get me wrong, I'm not blaming capitalism for any of this. Banks don't run on capitalism anymore, they run of public risk and privatized profits. That's like some ass-end of dimentia comucorporatism nonsense that never used to exist. Bailouts, corporate ass covering using tax payer dollars, and artificial government interventions have killed capitalism.

a reply to: burdman30ott6

Venezuela is way worse now that in the 90s, Chavistas are the only reason

Here is an explanation of how they managed to do it

www.abovetopsecret.com...

Nothing to do with banks, just plain old corruption

No human should have to starve in the 21st century, no matter what country you're in. This is very sad :/

I think people are finding any excuse to blame the banks rather than the corrupt, poorly run governments who are in charge.

It is lazy to blame the banks for the woes of Venezuela. The country is a model in poor government and political corruption.

Chávez, the dead ex-President was masterful in his propaganda. He merely kept a lid on everything and maintained a nice distraction of anti-Americanism, so beloved of people on these Boards at the time. With his death, the whole deck of cards and control seems to have slipped.

I am not defending some bankers, just sick of them taking the blame for the wrongs of bent government.

Regards

a reply to: paraphi

My argument would be that the government is merely a peon of the global banking system.

originally posted by: burdman30ott6
My argument would be that the government is merely a peon of the global banking system.

Just too simple. You can have greed without bankers. Corruption exists where there is power without checks and accountability. Venezuela is just corrupt and paying the price of mismanagement.

Regards

originally posted by: paraphi

originally posted by: burdman30ott6

My argument would be that the government is merely a peon of the global banking system.

Just too simple. You can have greed without bankers. Corruption exists where there is power without checks and accountability. Venezuela is just corrupt and paying the price of mismanagement.



Regards

You can absolutely have greed without bankers, but you cannot have authority to govern without the bankers in the world today. The power you're speaking of is a bartered commodity that is always negotiated between the business leaders and political leaders... money makes it all go around and, let's be honest here, the banks set all the policies related to that money.

it's beyond madness, a rich country like Venezuala, where gas is cheapper than water, most of the "cities" dont even have plumbed water, the people is being ribbed for years. And there always will be the Chavez cult, "Chavistas" like Indigent said, raised the idea that rich people are bad, if you have a car, then you have money, then you are a capitalist, so no problem about shooting you and robb the car... There are no jobs for young people, and they blame "malandreo" the crime, but people are starving, honored people that worked all their lifes and have nothing, cant have nothing. Maduro is a incult man, that was on politics because of the corrupt system. Well i'm not Venezuelan, but i have went there, last elections before Chavez died, the Tupamaro
(en.wikipedia.org...) killed people making campaign for the other candidates, and people in their houses couldn't even talk about their political choice, because their life would be in danger, "Chavismo" is more like a religious sect and now MAduro keeps it alive, the word of Chavez, and all the coutry is now the old "farwest" where you can kill or get killed. I have friends that study in university, that went for peace manifests and got shooted, nobody hears nothing in the news but everyone knows what's going on, except the major public, only peple that have family or friends in Venezuela realy knows whats going on.

This is a group of Venezuelan people living in Argentina, vid:
www.youtube.com...


Translation:
"We are a group of venezuelan people that are living in argentina, we are against the military repression that is happening in Venezuela in this moment there are enough evidence to support this, so please search it for yourself. We are facing a media (ignorance), we are facing unfairness, and the pepple that aplaud Chavez and the last election does not know that there is a brutal military repression, against students, working civilians,... We want a change, Venezuela is in dictatorship, and the dictatorship is not about the winning of the elections by Chavez, is about the parlament, the supreme court, the Bolivarian armed forces, and all organisms (public) are owned by Chavez. We are talking about a unilateral thinking that they want to impose on us, and it cant be like that, we are venezuelan we are in favor of Venezuela, we do not support violence from any kind of political party. We are suffering, there are more then 200 000 dead people, homicides, in 15 years of revolution, it enough. Three dead people on the marches of February the second, just because they went protesting for their rights, there are more then 600 dead people just from this year and only in DC (Caracas distrito capital). It's imposible that Maduro in his speach "tries to make the people look like terrorists" in their civil fight, because we are not against a government, we are gainst that peace is denied to us, we are gainst that our liberty to express as been robbed, we want to say what we think and what we suffer. Because all Venezuelan is a witness of what i'am saying, everyone is a victim of the violence, is a victim of the huge lines they have to wait to get basic products, we are victims of humiliation in a milionary country. We are suffering, they are taking our liberty away from us, and it's not posible to be quiet, it's not posible to have party defending Maduro and knowing whats going on, whean they were suposed to verify the information, because it is there to be seen. The freddom, the truth and god is in our part and we know it!"
I translated until the min 2:22 becaus e it would become to big, but i think that can give you an idea of whats going on...



All i can say is i hope the Venezuelan win, because it is imposible for such a rich country to have is own people in such misery.

Majunche todos los dias, fuerza estamos por vosotros