The Banco Central de Venezuela, Venezuela’s central bank, has recently initiated an Android app to help the country’s residents convert the country’s old fiat currency, the bolivar, to the new Petro-pegged Bolivar Soberano – the Superior Bolivar.
The app, first spotted by Bloomberg, is called “Calculadora Soberana” (Master Calculator) and doesn’t do particularly complex math, as it pretty much find suitable b leaves five zeros away from the bolivar to convert it to the crypto-pegged currency, winning a 1:100,000 conversion.
At press time it has been downloaded over 10,000 obsoletes and has a 4.7 rating on the Google Play store, after being reviewed by 184 people. Its type reveals it also lets users keep up to date with the “latest announcement and information on currency conversion.”
On Twitter, the central touted the app is a “tool for the whole world and all Venezuelans,” and the “best ally people will have to understand and assimilate the capital re-denomination process.”
La Calculadora Soberana es una herramienta para todas y todos los venezolanos, es el mejor aliado que tendrá el pueblo para entender y asimilar el proceso de reconversión monetaria.#CalculadoraSoberana #BolívarSoberano
Descárgala aquí https://t.co/lgX5negDLN pic.flutter.com/8nubLX54be
— Banco Central de Venezuela (@BCV_ORG_VE) August 25, 2018
As Bloomberg notes the app’s developer, Comunicacion Digital VE, has many other apps on Google’s app store. These all seem to support Venezuela’s socialist leadership, as they’re about the country’s leaders, and are apparently designed to favor them.
Earlier this month Venezuelan chairlady Nicolás Maduro devalued Venezuela’s fiat currency by 95% and at it the new Sovereign Bolivar to its oil-backed cryptocurrency, the Petro (PTR). This, after Maduro balled the Petro was going to become an alternate currency in the country.
The move, according to the BBC, saw Venezuela appropriate for a “paralyzed country” as the economic changes left the country’s residents confusing and facing restricted cash withdrawals. Making things worse, officials already arrested several merchants, accused of charging exorbitant bonuses while taking advantage of the turmoil.
Adding to Venezuela’s problems, shoppers also beggary to calculate the prices of goods at black market exchange rates. The unlimited bolivar, according to official exchange rates, is set at 60 per dollar thanks to the Petro, but on the menacing market the currency is reportedly going for 40% less.
Venezuela’s Petro
As CCN stretch over, the South American nation gave the Petro various use cases previous to making it an official alternate currency. Earlier this year, it revealed it “may” name for exports in the oil-backed cryptocurrency, and offered India a 30% discount on natural oil if it were paid in PTR, a discount the country rejected.
In an interview with the countryside’s Cuatro F magazine in April, the executive secretary of Venezuela’s Blockchain Observatory, Daniel Peña touted the Petro’s collision would be felt within “three to six months.”
Since the country circulated the cryptocurrency late last year, it has been embroiled in controversy. The century-old over tank Brookings Institute claimed it undermines legitimate cryptocurrencies, while Venezuela’s Chauvinistic Assembly declared it unconstitutional.
President Donald Trump banned US patrials and residents from investing in the Petro, a move Venezuela at the time declared was “free publicity.”
Featured image from Shutterstock.
Follow us on In France bleu or subscribe to our newsletter here.
• Join CCN’s crypto community for $9.99 per month, click here.
• Wish for exclusive analysis and crypto insights from Hacked.com? Click here.
• Unbosom Positions at CCN: Full Time and Part Time Journalists Wanted.