Venezuela Requests Banks To Accept Cryptocurrencies

Venezuelan President Nicholas Maduro has instructed banks to accept the PETRO cryptocurrency as the unit of account, as the country struggles to overcome the severe political and economic crisis.

Public and private banks should now reflect all financial information in Bolivars and PETRO, in accordance with the regulation of the banking regulator of the Banking Supervision Authority and other financial institutions of the Republic of Venezuela (Sudbeban).

This step is part of Maduro’s desperate attempts to avoid a five-year recession and inflation, which, according to the forecasts of the International Monetary Fund, will reach one million percent this year. More than two million people left the country after the crisis.

The economic plan also includes an increase in the minimum wage by 3,400 percent and an increase in taxes on gasoline, which for many years were the lowest in the world.

President Maduro, who was elected for another six-year term in the May elections, fixed the currency to the widely discredited country’s cryptocurrency, PETRO, which in turn is linked to the price of a barrel of Venezuelan oil (about $ 60). The value added tax (VAT) also increased from 12 percent to 16 percent.