Caracas Chronicles

(Friend of the blog Daniel Raguá sends us this corollary to Dorothy’s latest post)

Never mind inflation, scarcity, and all the rest. Here are some hidden nuggest in Venezuela’s recent economic history:

• The latest Doing Business Report ranks Venezuela 181 out of 189 countries in terms of ease of doing business.
• In the third quarter of 2013, loans to the manufacturing sector increased by 51%. But in the same quarter, manufacturing GDP shrunk by 0.3%.
• Between the third quarter of 2008 and the third quarter of 2013, manufacturing GDP shrunk by 4.1%.
• You know what else shrunk in the third quarter of 2013? Construction GDP, which decreased by 3.2%. Misión Vivienda is running on fumes.
• What little growth we had in 2013 was driven by the following sectors: financial institutions, communications, and public sector services. If you take out the financial sector, growth slows to a halt.
• Banking GDP rose by an amazing 19.5% in the third quarter of GDP. The strange thing is that the number of banking employees rose by a paltry 3%, the number of banks did not increase, and the number of bank branches only rose by 1%. The growth can be explained by an astonishing 64% growth in liquidity, i.e., the money in the economy.
• While oil exports grew by 459% between 1999 and 2012, actual physical number of barrels of oil exported shrunk by 16% in the same period.
• Between 2013 and 2019 alone, Venezuela will have to pay $42 billion just to service its foreign debt. This does not include debt to China.