VENEZUELA
Your Money’s No Good Here
The White House slapped sanctions on four more Venezuelan government officials and banned the digital currency that beleaguered President Nicolas Maduro hoped to use to circumvent other financial restrictions.
The measures are designed to put further pressure on Maduro ahead of a presidential election where he’s widely expected to stack the deck in his favor, the New York Times reported.
The four officials sanctioned include a Venezuelan state bank director, the head of the agency responsible for imposing price controls, the acting chief of the Office of the National Treasury, and the former president of the board of directors of the Venezuelan Institute of Social Security.
Banning the Petro – Venezuela’s nascent crypto-currency – sends a signal to other countries, such as Russia, considering digital currencies as a way to evade sanctions. But because the Petro hasn’t really succeeded, banning it isn’t likely to have much economic impact.
“The Trump administration’s desire here is to continue to gradually ratchet up sanctions,” the paper quoted a risk analysis expert as saying.
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