Oil Rich Venezuela Stops Accepting Dollars

Last week President Maduro warned that the country would this week ‘free’ itself from the US dollar. “Venezuela is going to implement a new system of international payments and will create a basket of currencies to free us from the dollar,” Yesterday Venezuela temporarily suspended the sale of U.S. dollars through its Dicom auction system. This (and other moves) was in response to U.S. sanctions put in place by the Trump administration. Trump claims the sanctions are there to punish the country’s autocratic leaders. Maduro claims Washington’s move was part of an “economic war”. This morning The Wall Street Journal reports that the Venezuela is already telling oil traders not to accept the US currency. More…