Aid for Venezuela Stopped at Border, Sold at 10-X Profit Locally

Food aid meant for Venezuela is stopped at the border with Columbia and then turned into a commodity for sale in local towns. Venezuelan strong man Nicolas Maduro portrayed the supplies as a pretext for invasion, or sent to humiliate and undermine his rule, so he ordered the borders to be closed. (Bloomberg photo)

Bloomberg/Quint – A week after the Nicolas Maduro regime threw up barricades along the border, there are still no signs that truckloads of humanitarian aid will be allowed into Venezuela from their way station in eastern Colombia. That doesn’t mean food isn’t being shipped over — but it has been going in the other direction.

Market shelves in the scruffy Colombian town of Puerto Santander are loaded with Venezuelan maize flour, rice, cheese spread and more, heavily subsidized consumer goods smuggled by government officials and ordinary citizens alike and sold at big mark-ups.

Gasoline is ferried from Venezuela too, as people cash in on the arbitrage opportunities created by extreme price distortions.

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