I think it’s critically important for everybody to understand what it’s like living in hyperinflation. I met our next guest at an event where we gave me some Bolivar bills that are no longer in circulation. Today, we are going to be talking about his experiences living through Hyperinflation in Venezuela and how what you are seeing in the US, is reminiscent of what he went through living in Venezuela as the hyperinflation was growing.

CHAPTERS:
0:00 The Truth is Worse Than You Think
1:24 Living Through Hyperinflation in Venezuela
5:24 Government Price Caps
13:18 Leading Up to Hyperinflation
16:52 How Did Citizens Transfer Their Wealth
18:09 Current Crisis in Venezuela
20:09 Food and Medicine
21:53 Consumer Confidence
23:55 Destruction of the Middle Class
27:07 Attempts at CBDC & Cryptocurrency
34:02 Economic Independence from the System
38:33 Hyper-Inflationary Depression

TRANSCRIPT FROM VIDEO:
Lynette Zang (00:00:00):

Alejandro, first of all, I would really like to thank you for being here today. I think it’s critically important for our viewers and for even not our viewers, but for everybody to understand what it’s like living in hyperinflation and also what you are seeing in the US today that may or may not be reminiscent of what you went through living in Venezuela as the hyperinflation was building.

Citizen from Venezuela (00:00:35):

Well first of all thank you for having me on. Well, it, it’s been many shows that I’ve been listening to it, but it’s kind of funny because when I found out about your YouTube channel, you were the first one who mentioned about Venezuela.

Lynette Zang (00:00:50):

Oh, I’ve been following Venezuela.

Citizen from Venezuela (00:00:52):

It’s very common that they mention Argentina. They mentioned Turkey, they mentioned Zimbabwe, but not many reference about Venezuela, which you talk my attention. You were the first one that actually pointed out Venezuela. And we are the one who had the highest hyperinflation level in the whole entire world.

Lynette Zang (00:01:11):

<Laugh>. Yes.

Citizen from Venezuela (00:01:13):

But things are unfolding really quick in United States. It’s unbelievable. The times that we’re having here in America the things that happened in Venezuela also happened very quick. It happened by changing the Constitution. Back in 1999 when Hugo Chavez reached out to the presidency. Mm-Hmm. <Affirmative>, he he changed the constitution opened up the turns levels. He can basically be reelected anytime he wants to, just like regimes do all the time. As far as the economy everything happened, like first they take control of the media. So I believe we already there. Yeah. So they control the narrative at the beginning before they getting power is very inclusive. Like they care about the poor people, that they want to unite, people, that kind of stuff. Then when they take control of the media for some reason, they start looking ways to split the communities by races, by women, by anything that they came out with. That way. Society’s not inclusive. It’s they trying to split everybody.

Lynette Zang (00:02:29):

Is that so they can point a finger, Well, it’s this group that’s doing this or making this happen, or, and also divide and conquer. What do you think?

Citizen from Venezuela (00:02:39):

Yeah, the whole idea is basically making sure that people will be not on the same page, that they be in different directions and people start fighting between each others. That’s kind of how they start pleading. Some people believe in the system, so I think that happened. Like in Cuba, you still have people who live down there and they believe in the system. They believe living the way they live over there is normal. There’s also Venezuela, Virginia’s been there for over, what, 20 years? Mm-Hmm. <Affirmative>. So there are some youngest people that they don’t know any other way to live, that the way they live now down there because they only thing they know yeah. So for them, the way they live, the life that they living down there. But it’s funny, like you know, they coming up right now with this CBDC. Yes. and it happen in Venezuela too, that they came out with control, pricing controls because the food was so high. So the government trying to do something about it, that opened up the black market. So if you wanted to buy good and services anything, basically you had to buy like a hiding at a high price. Nobody can see you. That kind of stuff. It took my attention because it is the CBDC being in place. They don’t really have to control prices. They can control the demand of the products. So basically they give them an allowance per items, per family, just like they do in Cuba. Just they don’t do it digitally, they do it manually.

Lynette Zang (00:04:16):

Well, let me let, can we back up for just a second? Because you made a comment about the government then putting caps on things and trying to control the prices. And we’re seeing that happen in Europe right now, Right? Where they’re talking about putting caps on all these prices. So can, can you go into that a little bit more?

Citizen from Venezuela (00:04:37):

Well same thing happen in Venezuela. So they create institutions trying to making sure that the prices that they were allowed to sell those products were in place. But when those things start happening, what happens is basically the food disappears. All the chills become empty. Because the people that are selling those product, they’re not gonna sell without any, making any profit. Right. so it doesn’t make sense at all. So that’s when you open up the black market for food, for certain services. So people will still be able to get those things, but in a different manner that happen down there in Venezuela.

Lynette Zang (00:05:21):

Do you feel like putting those price caps on it actually made it worse?

Citizen from Venezuela (00:05:27):

Of course, it made it worse because if you wanted to found medicine or importance items for your regular food, grocery shopping, you’re not able to fund it. Especially like happening here, baby formula, that kind of stuff that happened down there too at the beginning. Right now it is different knowing Venezuela, even though they, they have the Bolivar as a national tender currency, they use US dollars. So now everything is a lot different because everything is sell in dollars, even though Bolivar is the national currency.

Lynette Zang (00:06:07):

And also in the outlier counties or places in Venezuela, they actually price things in gold too.

Citizen from Venezuela (00:06:15):

They do. Those are the, like estate that are close to mines of gold, that kind of stuff. And they do but they were doing that also when the currency become very dysfunctional. Mm-Hmm. <Affirmative>, when you have to have so many bills in order to buy just a candy bar or a coffee, you have to have so many bills packed together. At one point, they were even just basically testing the weight of the bills. Yeah. So they know more or less how much amount they have in there, because it was so many bills that they were not able to count it, It was too many. So that, that happened over there too. Also, I remember people on their fixed income in Venezuela, like teachers some doctors depending on the field that you work on, those people disappear, or those people don’t wanna do those jobs anymore. So we had a deficit back then because their salaries were, were not enough to sustain their, their standard of living. So those people are redoing other activities, trying to survive during this economy. And of course now we have the immigration problem, which he took my attention that now we have the chairman Powell trying to raise interest rate to cool down the economy to control the demand. But in the other hand, we have open borders allowing too many immigrants coming over that are gonna require goods at services and that create inflation as well. Wow. When we don’t have the good and services under control as it’s happening here right now, I don’t think, we haven’t fixed the channel of food or there are still certain items that are still hard to find here, at least here in Florida. I don’t know

Lynette Zang (00:08:07):

Like what?

Citizen from Venezuela (00:08:09):

Well, mostly like a product mechanic for outer parts. I would say air conditions. Okay. Some filters, believe it or not, I was trying to find out the AC filter for my air condition unit. I was not able to find it. But at the same time, it’s, it’s kind of tricky. Like they plain double narrative. In one side, they trying to kill the demand, but in the other ones it’s just basically without immigration controls, it’s gonna open more because those people are gonna demand goods and services.

Lynette Zang (00:08:39):

Right. So is there a social net in Venezuela that increased to help people survive, you know, and be able to afford food or anything else? And, and those immigrants, are they in that system as well?

Citizen from Venezuela (00:09:00):

Well the government, they’re implement some social programs. The most common one is one that is called the clap bots is called, That’s how they call it down there. And basically is they provide certain items in a monthly basis. So people can buy for a lower price, they should size the products pretty much. So those are the products that people can buy over there to survive. But this is very small amount of products. There’s no enough product for you to have it for a month, but that’s how people eat over there. They sometimes they only have one meal at a day, you know, trying to making sure those product lasts for the entire month. But that’s what they

Lynette Zang (00:09:46):

Yeah. I was going to, I was going to say, I think that we’re seeing that a lot here now as food prices and, and globally as food prices are going up, people are spending the same in this country, number of dollars, but they’re buying less and trying to make it stretch longer.

Citizen from Venezuela (00:10:07):

Yes. I wish we had someone, and I wanted to thank you for the work that you do over there in Venezuela before all those things happening, because nobody knew, nobody see it coming. And when it came, nobody was prepared for it. Yes. So at least now you’ve been trying to wake up people and make they aware about the situation and that they’re still in their processing power on a daily basis. Now people have start seeing it, but I don’t think we are in the face of hyperinflation where people start getting rid of the money as soon as they get it. Not yet. I don’t think We’re not there yet. Correct. but people start kind of understanding like this inflation as a price rising prices but they don’t understand it, especially in the Latin community. I wish we have a better message because I think they’re gonna be suffering the most because they’re the one that they don’t have more financial education. They don’t understand this. This is different.

Lynette Zang (00:11:08):

Yeah. Well,

Citizen from Venezuela (00:11:10):

It is that global crisis. Oh. And it’s combined with different, it has a mix of a little bit of everything. It has an energy crisis, it has a currency crisis. We have a government crisis. So it’s gonna be interesting. I think the is gonna be social and rest. Mm-Hmm. <Affirmative> I’m glad that United States had the Second Amendment that a lot of people, I think the world fight for their liberty and their constitutions.

Lynette Zang (00:11:39):

I hope so.

Citizen from Venezuela (00:11:40):

And I believe that’s how it’s gonna end. Because Venezuela, we tried, but we don’t have that culture of buying guns or that kind of of stuff. We didn’t have that. Some people did, but not many. So we tried, we protest, we did a lot of stuff, but it didn’t work.

Lynette Zang (00:12:02):

It, you know, it’s kind of, it’s kind of interesting. But you know, just, just listening to you, So, were there signs that people just ignored leading up to the hyperinflation?

Citizen from Venezuela (00:12:20):

Well, yes. See the thing, it’s Venezuela, for example, they did three conversions of the currency. Yes, they did. I know you are aware of it. Some people,

Lynette Zang (00:12:32):

And you gave me that bill, you know, that $20,000 or $20,000 Bolivar bill, which has more value as a napkin for an empanada, doesn’t it?

Citizen from Venezuela (00:12:44):

Yes. So when those regimes is, is getting placed the first thing that they’re also trying to control is the currency going out of the country. Yes. So that happened in Venezuela. So when they get in power, the first thing that they did is basically they block the amount of money that you can pull out of the country. So that was one of the first measurement that they took back then. And then we started experiencing inflation. They added so many zeros to a currency, you know, the history, and then they do the bank holiday that you always mention about it. It happened on Sunday. When they do those type of thing they announce the re conversion, which is basically sometime one to three or one to five, depending on the situation. And they give you maximum amount of money that you can spend on that day, because after they do the announcement, it’s usually at nighttime, people start trying to spend whatever they can so they can at least trying to save some projecting power of whatever money they have in the bank. But that doesn’t work either. I mean, people try, but at the beginning, people didn’t know. They didn’t have a clue. Then they start having controls also on the maximum amount of money that you can pull out of the bank that happened too in Venezuela. So a lot of people believe on the bank system that their money, they can get it whenever they want to. It doesn’t happen that way. That happened in Venezuela. So then we had a control on the maximum amount we can pull out of the money in the bank. And also with the wire transfers, they put limits on a daily basis in the quantity. I think you were not allowed to do more than three, something like that.

Lynette Zang (00:14:37):

So can I ask you then, how, what now you, you no longer live in Venezuela, but how did the wealthy transfer their, their money out of Venezuela? I mean, if, if you went to say Miami, you could travel, right? You could wear a lot of gold, or you could carry some gold and silver in your pockets or, But do you know how they did that?

Citizen from Venezuela (00:15:03):

Yeah. Well, a lot of them see the dollar as a hedge. So a lot of them started changing their money with US dollar, which is kind of tricky, you know, because right now Venezuela is everything about dollar. But they don’t understand that the dollar is going through the same process as the believe was back then.

Lynette Zang (00:15:25):

Thank you for bringing that up.

Citizen from Venezuela (00:15:27):

Yes. So, not many people realize that, that the US dollars also loses purchasing power. They still feel that the dollar is, is, is stable. They see it as a stable currency. So that’s what they use down there. But I’m sorry, can you rephrase me?

Lynette Zang (00:15:46):

Yes. How did, do you know, you may or may not know this, but how the wealthy, because there, there’s always people that have money, right? So how did the wealthy of Venezuela get their money out or get some of their wealth out of Venezuela?

Citizen from Venezuela (00:16:03):

Yes. Most of them, they start transferring their business to different countries. That was the first thing that they did. Some of them I know some people that they start carrying jewelry in their belts with gold, because I was high, high amount of gold, you’re not allowed to pull that quantity out of the country. So they did different ways. But the number one was US dollar, because they see the US dollar as a stable currency. So even right now, in our days right now, they still use the US dollar down there.

Lynette Zang (00:16:38):

So you still have a family in Venezuela?

Citizen from Venezuela (00:16:41):

Yes, I do.

Lynette Zang (00:16:42):

So in January the world was told that Venezuela had finally broken the hyperinflation. Although when you look at the hype at the official numbers, they’re still well over 50% a month. But can you address or do you know from your family members that still live there? What’s going on right now even?

Citizen from Venezuela (00:17:09):

Well, you still have inflation, but not inflation instead of being with believe our currency is through US dollars.

Lynette Zang (00:17:18):

Ah, okay.

Citizen from Venezuela (00:17:20):

So instead of your experience inflation with believer, you do it through dollars. So if you have a, let’s say a used to be a hundred dollars, instead of being a hundred dollars. No, it’s $120. And it is, We also, I I will say that down there they have also some sort stagflation, because certain items, the ones that people demand the most, those are the ones that have inflations. The items that people, they don’t requir most those are the ones that actually it’s not that expensive. You know,

Lynette Zang (00:17:54):

We, we see the same thing here. I was reading an, an article from one of the government agencies on caviar that is not inflated at the same level as meat, but they’re both in the food category. So instead of getting a real read on what people buy and actually use every day, it makes food inflation look a whole lot less for that same reason. Or at least when they announce the official numbers.

Citizen from Venezuela (00:18:24):

Yeah. Same thing happened over there. Certain meats were more expensive than other. Of course, the ones that are lower price, those are the ones that people were buying, Right. Because they cannot afford to buy the regular ones. And of course, they start changing behavior in their entire life, how you behave, you know, as far as cooling your budget trying to see how you can basically expand your resources with less, you know, So a lot of people is experience that in Venezuela as well.

Lynette Zang (00:18:58):

Well, one of the things that I noticed, let’s go back to food, because typically during hyperinflationary events, food and then medicine become the single most important thing for most people.

Citizen from Venezuela (00:19:12):

Okay. Yeah. And that you bring that up because, for example, like health insurance is one of the industry that disappear during the hyper inflation without the dollar. Now they’re bringing them back, but you have to pay them in US dollars, and they cover certain limit in dollars. But during the hyperinflation with believers some people had health insurance, but because the hyperinflation, whatever their coverage was, was not able to cover for their treatments on a daily basis, the prices for procedure were more expensive because of the medicine, because of the labor, everything. So at one point, I will say that not many people had a health insurance because it was worthless. What they were covering versus the amount of the cost for the procedures down there. As far as the foot goes some people like I say they opt out for the social programs from the government where they buy the, the cloud bots. And that’s basically how all they can afford to buy that bot is it’s less than one month supply.

Lynette Zang (00:20:32):

So, but I wanna kind of go, I wanna dig into that a little bit more in that, you know, the people at, at what point, I have no idea how you’re gonna answer this, but at what point were the people discouraged from providing their own food? Because I know once they got to a point, at particularly in the cities, all of a sudden they’re supposed to have chickens and they’re supposed to raise gardens and things like that. And here in this country, most people are clearly dependent on the grocery stores and that infrastructure. So can you kind of relate those two things?

Citizen from Venezuela (00:21:13):

Well this happened during the stage when the government bring the price control and people are not able to find things on the shelf. Mm-Hmm. <Affirmative>. So that’s when the people I start become more in, imagine what they can do in order to survive. Mm-Hmm. <Affirmative>. So some people start getting their little forms, or people start getting chicken, as you say, it’s depending what type of property they have. You know, also, not everybody was able to do the same thing. My uncle, he had lime trees, they had a tomato trees, they have onions, trees, lettuce. And they have also some chicken as well. So a lot of the portion of their regular meals were provided by their own, their own garden.

Lynette Zang (00:22:01):

Yes.

Citizen from Venezuela (00:22:02):

But not everybody was able to do that. Certain people of the population, not everywhere.

Lynette Zang (00:22:09):

So with, is that like the higher level socioeconomic level? Because I know also in Venezuela abject poverty grew to 90%, Right? Didn’t say a hundred percent. Yeah. But 90%, I

Citizen from Venezuela (00:22:24):

Don’t think, I think hyperinflation is all about to eliminate the middle class. And you, everybody either poor, or if you are rich, you are rich you’re not gonna change your status. You’re already rich. They stay rich. But the middle class disappear. And I think that’s one of my major concerns here in America, because I think that’s what they going after they middle class.

Lynette Zang (00:22:50):

We’ve been watching the destruction of the middle class really since about 2000. That’s actually, you know, it’s, it’s slower with the advent of, you know, of Amazon and the unequal playing field, they didn’t have to charge taxes. They’d go in and undercut cause Wall keeps street kept supporting them. So, and then certainly through 2008, that was a huge obvious hit to the middle class. And then since 2020, another huge, huge, I mean, there’s not much middle class left here, unfortunately.

Citizen from Venezuela (00:23:27):

Yeah. I also like to point out like I had a $78,000 in a student loan that I had a work double extra shift to pay them off. So I feel so happy when I paid them off. I was very happy. And now that I start listening this, that they’re gonna just basically give them $10,000 to $20,000 in a student loan credit that’s just basically taking purchasing power from them. They don’t realize, because that’s just basically trying to that’s just promoting basically inflation. People think that their, their belief that they’re helping them, but in reality, they just taking their purchasing power away. Some people see it, some people don’t. Yeah.

Lynette Zang (00:24:14):

I’m not so sure that that’s helping, but, you know. Yeah. What I think that what that happens to be about is the ability for people that are saddled with that debt, it changes their credit rating, and then that enables them to go out and buy a house at overvalued levels because it just, it puts them in a different looking fiscal picture. But $10,000, a lot of people have a lot more debt than that, and the taxpayers have to pay it. You’re absolutely right. It is inflationary.

Citizen from Venezuela (00:24:49):

Yes. And like I said, some people believe that they’re helping them, but, and, and there’s not really a help because that basically bring inflation in a higher level. So you can afford less items, as you were saying, with, with the currency, you know? So, but I think it’s gonna be very interesting when they bring this CBDC’s, because like I say, I think instead of bringing price control on rent on food items, I think they just basically gonna program the currency however they want. And basically that’s, we have to follow whatever they, they say under that program. Of course, like you said at the beginning, it’s gonna be a friendly, everybody will like it. Everybody think it’s gonna be the best free money Mm-Hmm. <Affirmative>, yes, free money, but, and then at the end when people start realizing, Wait a minute, I only allowed to buy only one item, so I don’t have the freedom that I can buy as many as I want as we do it now? That’s when people start working on realize what it is. You know, it’s all about taking control over your and your liberties, because at the end, that’s, that’s what it is. You know, it’s taking your freedom.

Lynette Zang (00:26:02):

So what do you think would’ve happened? I mean, I know that in Venezuela, they made an attempt at a CBDC, but it gets very local. I mean, there aren’t a lot of people bartering.

Citizen from Venezuela (00:26:15):

Well, the way they did it in Venezuela, they came out with that is called Petro is a cryptocurrency, whatever they call it. And it’s back up by oil. But of course nobody believe it. Nobody had confidence on it, so it never worked. So I don’t, I don’t know anybody that use it. I think if they use it, they use it for, to pay for like driver’s license or that kind of services with the government. Anything that is associated with the government, because they do take it. But in a daily basis, I don’t think anybody used that. That’s a failure program.

Lynette Zang (00:26:51):

You know, it’s interesting because they had a similar kind of result. Not that nobody used it, but China tried to first saying, Oh yeah, well, we’ll just work side by side with the other private cryptocurrencies. And that didn’t last very long. That dialogue didn’t last very long. So I, you know, I hope that it’s hard for people to adopt it, but I also hope that we have other choices outside of it. Cause you make a really valid point about people having putting value in dollars when the dollar

Citizen from Venezuela (00:27:30):

Is losing purchasing power as well. Yeah. I try to explain that I to my near family members so they can understand it, and they have to see all their ways to start trying to save their purchasing power their savings which is gold, silver,

Lynette Zang (00:27:49):

You know? Right. I was gonna ask you, how easy is it to get gold and silver in Venezuela right now?

Citizen from Venezuela (00:27:57):

It’s not that hard. However when the crisis was really bad in Venezuela, the hyperinflation were in a highest level. A lot of people ought for to their goal and jewelry trying to survive. So, so definitely those items work. They were the ones who actually saved some people, you know what I mean, by putting meal in their, in their table. But those were just jewelry that people had as a middle class, you know, they were not with the proper of safe money or

Lynette Zang (00:28:33):

So like jewelry and things like that. Yes,

Citizen from Venezuela (00:28:36):

Exactly. Yes. Well,

Lynette Zang (00:28:38):

So

Citizen from Venezuela (00:28:38):

They didn’t have it because that purpose, they used to have it because they used to wear them. Right. But when the hyperinflation we’re in the highest level, people start turning those in for money so they can purchase food. But I think the major thing during hyper inflation is when we go into liquidity crisis, which is basically when the lenders basically don’t give out any loans. And that’s happening right now in Venezuela. There is no banking system as far as getting loans. So if you would like to purchase a home or vehicle, it has to be done in cash. There is no finance at all. And that’s because of the level of inflation is basically way higher than the interest rates, which is happening right now here in America. I don’t understand. How is it possible? Our last CPI was 8.2, 8.1, I believe. Yep. And we still have some mortgage rate below under that I don’t understand how they keep doing it because it’s an inflation rate. So it doesn’t make sense to me.

Lynette Zang (00:29:51):

Did you see, it doesn’t make sense. It doesn’t make sense to me either, especially since they juggle all of the numbers too. So you do really think it was 8.1 or 8.2. But they have to keep the illusion going. Although I saw mortgage rates have now in this country breached 6%, but the advantage that we have are 30 year fixed mortgages.

Citizen from Venezuela (00:30:19):

Right. Well, they now become even more creative as far as mortgage. I happened to talk to one lender last week, now they have a 40 years mortgage. And they’re offering now interest only for the first 10 years. And then the following year is when you start actually kicking to the principal. So they, they come in creative with different products, trying to keep the housing market alive. But when we are talking about almost, because 6% is the entry level rate for someone who has an excellent credit, but for someone who is average trying to buy their first home, I think the interest rate is around seven, seven and a half. If I think you probably, and it could be higher mm-hmm. <Affirmative>, because the 10 year treasury, I think was almost four percent yesterday. I was looking at a 3.9, something very, very close to four. I haven’t checked them today. But as you know, that’s how the mortgage ready go by.

Lynette Zang (00:31:29):

It’s true. And in England there are a lot of products that have just like that disappeared from the shelf.

Citizen from Venezuela (00:31:38):

Yes.

Lynette Zang (00:31:39):

Right. So we’re already seeing that pullback, and that’s what happened in 2008 with the subprime crisis. I mean, liquidity dried up in 24 hours. And, but I you know, just looking at what’s happening today, we’ve seen Well, okay, today is the, what’s today? The 29th, I think. September 28Th, Okay. So just today we saw the Bank of England go from tightening to now going into the bond market and, and turning around. And they don’t wanna call it QE because QE original’s intention was to develop inflation, grow inflation. And this is about saving the children, saving the pension plans. So, but it’s, it’s the same thing. What do you think looking around with your experience from Venezuela, you know, do you think that the central banks are going to, and governments and actually there was a report that I just did a little while ago on basically the globe. So through the IMF, it was an IMF report eliminating the independence of the central bank so that the central bank and government can work hand in hand to, I don’t know, to do what they’ll, they’ll say to fight inflation. But did you see that in Venezuela as too where that that independence from Central Bank is just eliminated

Citizen from Venezuela (00:33:17):

During hyperinflation? There is no independence institutions, they all work for the government, including the Central Bank. I believe right now, even here in United States I believe the Federal Reserve work with the government they try to pretend that they’re independent. But if you see the narrative, you know, thinking about it, thinking about it, and then they can always we’re gonna go to a soft landing. Now the narratives about we’re gonna have some pain that they trying to control back inflation to 2%, which is, I don’t think they’re gonna be able to do that. No.

Lynette Zang (00:34:00):

But what do you think, But what do you think about the IMF actually coming out and talking about the elimination of the independent Central Bank on a global basis, not just a localized basis. What does, from your experience, what does that tell you?

Citizen from Venezuela (00:34:19):

Well, they need to bring confidence back from people, because when confidence is being lost, especially right now that this is a global crisis, of course, they have to come out with a new way to try to bring confidence from societies and start believing back in the system. So I believe there is a way to, for them to try to tell people that this time is gonna be different.

Lynette Zang (00:34:47):

Oh, they, they always say that

Citizen from Venezuela (00:34:49):

<Laugh> and keep us under the debt system that we have. And, but at then, it’s the same. I, I think it’s just basically another way to try to, like I say just trying to bring confidence, because at the end, that’s what we lose during monetary crisis, people lose confidence in the currency. So they’d rather to have anything besides paper.

Lynette Zang (00:35:16):

Well, that’s true. I’m, when when I look at that, what that tells me is that they’re setting up the globe for, for a very nasty hyperinflationary event. Because as you pointed out in Venezuela, it was just one, you know, they absolutely, Yes. You know, I, I agree with you that the central banks are already working with the governments, but there is that thin line division that we are supposed to perceive as the central bank is independent. I’ve never, in my long career, never ever, ever have I seen a regulatory body like the imf that’s all treasury secretaries and Central Bank chiefs, that those are the members of almost every country on the, on this planet. Never have I seen a body like that come out and talk about eliminating that division. They wanna keep the perception that it’s still separate, but you know, they have to come up with new ways. And that’s the other thing. People always perceive that they, that the powers that be, so the governments and the central banks want things to remain the same. But maybe, you know, and maybe you can relate this back to Venezuela, at what point, when a government and central bank acknowledge that this is the end, it’s the end, it’s the end of the system as we know at the end of the currency as we know it, and just sort of say, Okay, we’ve got the CBDCs here to take over. As much as they talk about not being ready yet, personally, I think that’s garbage. They already have the Fed Now account in place that’s supposed to come out in next year, 2023. I mean, we have a lot of things that are shifting in 2023. LIBOR and SOFR so like 600 trillion contracts. Did those all get derivative contracts? Did those all get reset by now? I mean, I don’t know, there’s a lot of things that are happening in 2023. Could this really just be the support for the last bit of, like, would you say that as well as it a hyperinflationary depression?

Citizen from Venezuela (00:37:45):

I, yes, definitely. It is still there. Yes. So some people are trying right now to advertise that there is a recovery in the country, but that’s, I don’t believe that I still have family down there and the economy is very tight. You know, it is very hard to survive over there. I’m not saying people, every, every family is still under the same situation, but definitely in general, yes, they are still in hyperinflation in economy in depression.

Lynette Zang (00:38:15):

So I think that maybe by that overtly eliminating that division, then we could see a global hyperinflationary depression, which would put enough pain on the population potentially

Citizen from Venezuela (00:38:32):

You remember me, they did something over there, which is, they came out with it wasn’t a digital currency, but it was a new ID that you must have in order for you. For example, if you want to put gas in your car with lower prices from the ones that beside the government, you must have that ID.

Lynette Zang (00:38:56):

Oh, wow.

Citizen from Venezuela (00:38:57):

So that kinda bring me to the credit scores that is associated with the CBDC. So they did have something similar. So if you wanted to have any benefits coming out of the government, you have to have that id. As far as currency, they don’t use, I mean, bar barely cash in Venezuela, most of the transactions are done with debit cards or credit cards. Which is, to me, digital currency is just basically, in a way, it’s just a card and everybody just use it, but it’s digital. The government controlled the amount of money on a daily basis that you can transfer. So there’s a maximum. And, you know, funny, this happened to me, I think like three weeks ago. I was in the bank. I happened to do some withdraw out my account, and I was looking at my transactions and I see a penalty fee on my bank account. So I called the bank and found out about this fee because I never overdraft. So what, what was the issue with it? So apparently for that type of account that I had I only allowed to pull this amount of money. Otherwise I started kicking the penalty via at that point. Yeah. So that was something that took my attention when that happened to me. So it’s not like they’re telling you you can’t pull that limit, but they started actually charging you if you wanna pull over that limit. I didn’t know that. Of course, I found out because I was looking at it in my bank statement.

Lynette Zang (00:40:40):

That’s, you know, I, I’ve been watching what we can do in our banking system, especially, especially since 2008, really just, and they do it in a stealth move more and more and more narrow. And if you get something in the mail, there’s like a little wood sheet glossy thing that makes whatever the changes that they’re going to do, seem like a no big dealer until you go to your bank and you find that it’s, it’s gotten a whole lot harder to wire transfer funds. They ask you all of these questions, they’re very intrusive. They have all of these excuses. Yeah, I.

Citizen from Venezuela (00:41:21):

And it’s very important that people understand that liquidity crisis is not just about people getting loans or finances. It also, it’s about your savings or your bank accounts. Because when those things happens, it happened in Venezuela at different times where they closed completely the bank system. And basically you were not allowed to pull any money out of your accounts. So those things happen some people don’t believe, but in Venezuela it happens. So at one point I think we, we will see it.

Lynette Zang (00:42:00):

Oh, we will definitely see it.