Venezuela’s Inflation To Hit 1,000,000 Percent By End of 2018

By Soko Directory Team / October 9, 2018

Kenyans often go ballistic every time an inflation rate moves above 5 percent but what about those people in a country where inflation rate is almost hitting 1,000,000 percent? Yes. You heard it right, 1 million percent.

According to the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the inflation rate for the economically troubled Venezuela will hit the million percent mark by the end of 2018. This will be the highest ever inflation rate in the world.

According to IMF, the Venezuelan economy is now worse than that of the Weimer Republic in 1923 and that of Zimbabwe in 2000s where people carried money in bags just to buy a pack of tissue papers.

Currently, in Venezuela, the local currency has lost so much value that to buy bread, money has to be weighed in terms of kilograms. The currency lost value by more than 100,000 percent and the common people are the most affected.

IMF estimates that the economy in Venezuela will shrink by 18 percent by the end of 2018 with the GDP per capita falling below 10,000 US dollars.

“Venezuela remains stuck in a profound economic and social crisis,” said IMF in a statement.

Tribulations in Venezuela became worse when Nicolas Maduro won a sham presidential election that gave him six more years at the helm. The election was boycotted by the opposition who had an amazing support of the majority.

“We expect the government to continue to run wide fiscal deficits financed entirely by an expansion in base money which will continue to fuel an acceleration of inflation as money demand continues to collapse,” noted IMF.

Millions of Venezuelans have taken off from their country to other countries where they can get a ‘currency’ that can accommodate them. For instance, more than 870,000 Venezuelans are now living in Colombia.

Banks in Venezuela are also refusing to take in cash in local currency because there is ‘no space to store’ the voluminous cash.

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