مقاله سال ۲۰۱۷

۱٫ Introduction

In February 2003, with the creation of the Comision de Administración de Divisas (CADIVI), the Government of Venezuela decided to introduce a policy of capital controls to reduce the massive capital flight. In Venezuela, to have access to foreign exchange, consumers of foreign goods have to go through a very complicated bureaucratic procedure in order to be assigned a quota of dollars at the official exchange rate set by the government1 . This restricted access to foreign exchange has given rise to a foreign-currency black market. The price of the currency on the black market carries a significant premium due to the limited supply of government dollars at the official exchange rate (Malone & Ter Horst, 2010).

The policy of capital controls in Venezuela has become progressively more complicated and restrictive, and by December 2014, the Venezuelan foreign-exchange system included three different exchange rates. The first exchange rate was operated by CENCOEX2 and was where dollars had the lowest cost (6.3 bolivars for one USD) and could only be used by government entities or importers of vital goods such as food and medicine. The second exchange rate was set at 12 bolivars per USD and was called the SICAD3 I, and could be used to pay for non-priority imports, but was assigned by auctions. Finally, the third exchange rate was called the SICAD II, in which the dollar was left to fluctuate in a currency band with a floor and ceiling of 49 and 53 bolivars, respectively, and was assigned to the general public by limiting quotas through a complicated system of auctions (The Economist, 2014). In February 2015, the system was amended once again, creating the SIMADI4 and replacing the SICAD II. This last system allows the dollar to fluctuate freely, but individuals have a quota of USD 300 per day, USD 2,000 per month, and USD 10,000 per year, and in the case of entities, they have no limits if they sell foreign currency, but to buy it, they have to abide by the rules of SICAD I. In summary, Venezuela has three legal exchange rates: 1) CENCOEX at 6.3 bolivars per USD, 2) SICAD I at 12 bolivars per USD, and 3) SIMADI at 170 bolivars per USD as of February 12, 2015 (PWC, 2015).

These restrictions imposed by the Venezuelan government resulted in a thriving black market for foreign currency. The huge difference between the black dollar exchange-rate premium and the official exchange rate has had detrimental consequences for the economy of Venezuela (Kamin, 1993; Krugman, 1979; Kharas & Pinto, 1989; Onour & Cameron, 1997).