Venezuela (despite everything I'm sure you've heard) is a great place to be a finance wideboy. Banks make eye-popping profits and returns on equity, finance houses who play the yield curve clean up year after year, commissions on trades are licences to print money.
For example, let's check that parallel 'permuta' exchange market, sewn up tight as a duck's sphincter by the local moneymen so that those who want janquidolares pay through the nose. Here's how Venezuelan Bolivar Fuerte, and a range of other South American currencies, are trading at retail exchange house/street level today.
| Country | Bid | Ask |
| Venezuela | 6,67 | 6,93 |
| Peru | 2,99 | 3,01 |
| Argentina | 3,815 | 3,845 |
| Colombia | 1990 | 2000 |
| Brazil | 1,85 | 1,87 |
So now let's compare the percentage differences of the 'bid' (what they'll pay you if you take dollars to the window and withdraw local currency) and the 'ask' (what you need to pay them to get a US dollar):
Yep, Venezuelan forex is great work if you can get it. Cartel? Price gouging? Bankers ripping the people off? Shome mishtake shurely ossifer!