Hello again readers.

I received recent reports that confirm the severe fuel scarcity in my former town is getting conflictive. There are struggles with the national guards and citizenship, and there is at least one person in jail I know of, at the moment of writing this.

Here are three reasons my decision to bug out of Venezuela was a good one:

Price of precious metals. One coin of an ounce of silver is worth 20$. 5$ over spot price. Guns, I don´t know. It would be stupid to try to respond to an online ad to buy a gun. Getting a permit is impossible, so the only way is illegally. Not advisable.

There is a remarkable water scarcity. No power grid means no pumping, and less and less gasoline is available for gensets. Last week I published about reports from inside the oil industry mentioning that gasoline would last one month. Immediately the governors issued rationing schemes, and the black market got much worse. There are rumors of people working with official emergency vehicles, such as ambulances getting fuel without and reselling it.

There is a HUGE inflationary process in DOLLARS. $100 is worth nothing. The only ways to get money are by offering services or products. Bartering, buying something used that is damaged, repairing and reselling it for a fair price. The control of the country is divided by several gangs, each one reporting to the respective member. I have mentioned this before. The supply of essentials, though, is such as that things are starting to become really ugly. Of course, those with guns and resembling some "official authority" are going to "manage" these goods…whatever that means. More than likely they will just keep everything they could seize for themselves and their warlords. This is only to prepare the ground for a situation that will be impossible to deal with. I have been in touch with people supporting the regime, though. For them, things are…" normal". There are no problems, and "social networks make a fuss" about all the scarcity and turmoil now in place.

The gasoline shortage in Venezuela has gotten much worse.

I am going to review some of the reports of the city of Maracaibo. It is considered the economic capital of the country because it produced very good quality oil and there was money flow all over the place. Large buildings, luxury subdivisions, good roads. Despite the burning sun and hot weather, people there love their city. The oil revenues really went to the infrastructure, managing of the public money was not as corrupted as it was in other eras.