Slumping crude prices have investors and analysts warning of a potential messy default in Venezuela, with state-owned oil company PDVSA owing some US$10 billion in external debt payments due this year. With crude hovering around US$28 per barrel, Venezuela could have trouble satisfying its obligations.
Bank of America predicted president Nicolas Maduro would merge Venezuela’s three-tier currency controls into two, replacing the strongest rate of 6.3 bolivars to the dollar with a level of 35. Greenbacks go for around 865 bolivars on the black market.
Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro's government has decreed a 60-day economic emergency for the recession-hit OPEC nation reeling from low oil prices and a sputtering state-led economic model. The government on Friday also published the first macroeconomic data for more than a year, showing GDP dropped in the third quarter while inflation surged.
Venezuela's first lady on Tuesday broke her silence on the arrest of her two nephews on drug trafficking charges, saying they were kidnapped by the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration.Cilia Flores, who serves in congress, told Venezuelan weekly Tal Cual that the U.S. was seeking revenge and trying to force the socialists from power in Venezuela.
Venezuela sank deeper into a messy political crisis Tuesday as the opposition-controlled National Assembly suspended its session after the Supreme Court declared it null and void. Speaking before a nearly empty chamber, speaker Henry Ramos Allup, a fierce opponent of President Nicolas Maduro, declared the National Assembly lacked a quorum and would reconvene Wednesday morning.
Venezuela headed into ever more complicated political waters on Monday as the Supreme Court declared the newly opposition-controlled legislature null and void and the opposition vowed to continue defying the judges.
Venezuela's government upped the ante Thursday against the new opposition-led Congress with a protest against the removal of images of venerated late populist leader Hugo Chavez and a legal appeal against the swearing-in of three legislators.
Venezuela's opposition broke on Tuesday the government's 17-year grip on the legislature and vowed to force out President Nicolas Maduro despite failing for the time being to clinch its hoped-for “supermajority.” The National Assembly swore in deputies to 163 of the 167 seats, with four lawmakers -- three opposition and one pro-government -- suspended pending a lawsuit over alleged electoral fraud.
At a summit marked by strong differences between Argentina and Venezuela, Mercosur signed a statement in defense of the unrestricted support of human rights. Earlier in the day there was a serious exchange between Argentine president Mauricio Macri who demanded all political prisoners in Venezuela be set free, and president Nicolas Maduro foreign minister who replied that Macri was 'meddling' in Venezuela's affairs and was applying a 'double standard' on the issue.
The presidents of Mercosur member-countries have confirmed attendance to the group's summit scheduled for next 21 December and hosted by Paraguay, the country that currently holds the rotating chair, according to diplomatic sources in Asuncion.