He Central Bank of Bolivia (BCB) it restricted the purchase of foreign currency in the country to direct sales and people began to agglomerate in La Paz. The annoyance of the Bolivians went viral on social networks because they approached to buy and were denied the purchase.
“They should not deceive like this, why are they making fun of it,” said a lady who was waiting to be seen at the Bank this Tuesday. The long lines were notorious, when journalists from the national media questioned the reason for the lines, they assured that it was because “there were only three officials attending.” The Bolivians who went to the banks assured that they arrived at the financial entity and there was no foreign currency to buy. It is for this reason that the BCB issued a statement so that those who need to buy foreign currency, can assist other banking entities, as reported by the Bolivia.com portal.
“In this sense, the BCB communicates that dollars can also be purchased through Banco Unión and the rest of the financial intermediation entities throughout the country, at the exchange rate authorized for the financial system,” said the directive. from the bank.
Throught social media, a group of people was observed claiming to the security guards as they had given the indication that they would only sell to the first ten people and that the rest should leave the bank.
The Government recognized that in the country there is “an unusual withdrawal of foreign currency”, which has caused a “lack of liquidity” in dollars in the country. However, he has never confirmed that there is a “dollar shortage.”
The banking authorities have taken the determination to expand the attention in boxes before the claims of the users. The hours were extended until 21:00. However, people who need to buy more than 5,000 dollars must justify the origin and destination of the use of foreign currency.
The arguments of the run
The amounts and arguments for the purchase of dollars were different, among them, the need to pay real estate debts in that currency, so this measure “is good for them,” according to what they told the news agency. EFE Some people lining up.
Other people sought to acquire dollars “just in case” given the movement of this currency in recent weeks, since many were unable to buy the required amounts in private banks, where in some cases withdrawals of large amounts were limited.
“There is a significant demand for foreign currency, not only because of a speculation factor, but because there has been less production of dollars for the financial system, which has evidently worried the population,” he commented to EFE the economist and former director of the BCB Gabriel Espinoza.
This unusual movement occurred after the recent reports on the level of Net International Reserves (NIR) were released, which at the beginning of February were around 3.8 billion dollars, one of the lowest levels since 2014, when they reached a peak of 15,122 million.
Source: Ambito
