Economic War. The Evidence.

Alfredo Serrano Mancilla, a Spanish economist who has served as an advisor to the Maduro Government, has published an article that has been extensively shared in social networks. 

The article is titled “The Evidence of the Economic Crime against Venezuela” and begins with a well-known conspiracy theory rhetorical formula: most analysts are either blind or have consciously chosen to ignore the evidence of a wide spread conspiracy. In this case, the evidence of the “continued economic aggression Venezuela has suffered during the last years.”

The purpose of Serrano’s article is therefore to lay out the “manifest proofs” of the “constant harassment” the Venezuelan economy has suffered. These are:

1. Country Risk: according to Serrano the low credit rates given to Venezuela by credit rating agencies are inappropriate, given the “fact” that Venezuela has always honored it debt.

2. Default terminology: The word “default” is inappropriately used in the Venezuelan case. News agencies have used the term “selective default” to signify late payments by the Venezuelan government. This is evidence, for Serrano, that “remarks against Venezuela do not follow criteria of economic rationality.”

3. Trump: Us President’s executive order has to be read “in detail to realize that it is an explicit boycott” of the Venezuelan economy.

4. Blockade by the international financial system: According to Serrano, Citibank, Comerzbank, and Deutsche Bank, among other international financial institutions, have barred Venezuela from international funds.

5. Blockade of food and basic products: A by-product of the previous point, Venezuela’s payment for imports has been turned back and this has limited the countries access to basic imported goods. The recent pork import scandal, which the Maduro government blamed on Portugal for not sending the Christmas perniles Venezuela had allegedly payed for, is not included in Serrano’s article.

6. Black Market Dollar: the “parallel illegal exchange” rate of the local currency does not have, according to Serrano a real “‘parallel’ with any macroeconomic variable.” It is in reality, “a political weapon of economic destruction, used to induce an inordinate increase of inflation.”

“Reality is undisputable,” closes Serrano his article, “no other country is being subjected to an economic siege of such high intensity and persistency.”