Venezuela Bondholders Beware: Inflation Spiked 100% In April?

Inflation in Venezuela may have reached 100.7% year over year in April, bringing monthly average inflation to 8.5% in the first four months of the year.A sample bolivar bank note stamped with “devalued,” in a Caracas store.So says Bank of America/Merrill Lynch Analyst Francisco Rodriguez, who crunched 33 data series from official and private sources. Venezuela’s central bank has not published the Consumer Price Index series since December of 2014. Rodriguez writes that anecdotal evidence suggests that some basic consumer goods are very hard to find at regulated prices but can be found at much higher prices on the street, so the rise in regulated prices may underestimate realized inflation. And as the table below shows, the rice and corn meal prices skyrocketed in April, according to BofA/Merrill, along with other staples from sugar to diapers. More…