Venezuelan VP Rodriguez Announces New Digital Bolivar Currency

Venezuela's executive vice-president, Delcy Rodríguez, announced this Monday a new monetary expression of the bolivar, suppressing six zeros from the current value, in an effort to achieve the monetary sovereignty of the South American country.

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“Any amount expressed in national currency will be divided by 1 million. That is to say, 1 million is going to be equal to one bolivar, 6 million equals 6 bolivars”, indicated the vice-president in a press conference. “What we are doing is deleting six zeros in our national currency to make it easier to use and give a boost to the digital expression of our national currency, which will ease transactions in our currency,” she added.

“We are not affecting the value of the bolivar at all”, clarified Rodríguez, who affirmed that “this change is only a monetary scale and that the Central Bank of Venezuela will continue to offer physical bolivars both in coins and paper.”

In this respect, she assured that the denominations of 0.50 and 0.25 in coins and the 5, 10, 20, 50 and 100 bolivar bills will coexist with the old bills until the moment only these will remain. “The exchange market remains unaltered”, she asserted, referring to the price of foreign currency for purchase and sale in the bank.

Rodriguez said that the monetary expression seeks to diversify the electronic mechanisms. Therefore, all public banks will migrate to digital. From Thursday, September 30 at 08H00, local time (14:30 GMT) the banking platforms will pause their operations.

“For some hours they will be without digital system, but from Friday, October 1st at 06H00 (24H30 GMT) the systems of the different banks, both public and private, will be gradually incorporated”, said the official.

Likewise, Rodriguez informed that, from October 4 to Oct 10th, despite restrictions (radical week) dictated by the country due to the Covid-19,  the banks will exceptionally provide services to facilitate the transactions needed by the population, respecting the biosecurity measures.

During the press conference, Rodriguez was accompanied by the Vice-Minister in charge of the Digital Economy, Insurance, Banking, and Securities (recently appointed President of Banco de Venezuela) Román Maniglia. Also at the announcement were the President of Banco Bicentenario, Simón Serpa and the Vice President of Banco del Tesoro, Angel Gabriel Bello on behalf of the state-owned banks.

Representing the private banking sector were the executive president of Banco Mercantil, Nelson Acosta; the president of Banco Provincial, Agustín Antón; the president of Banco del Caribe, Juan Carlos Davos; the president of BOD, Víctor Vargas; the president of Banesco Banco Universal, José Grasso; and the president of BNC Banco Universal, Jorge Luis Nogueroles.