page_title: 2013–present economic crisis in Venezuela
section_title: Inflation
hierarchical_section_title: 2013–present economic crisis in Venezuela / Inflation
caption_attribution_description: English: The value of one US dollar in Venezuelan bolívares (VEF/VES) on the black market through time, according to DolarToday.com. Blue vertical lines represent every time the currency has lost 90% of its value relative to the US dollar since the last one. This has happened four times since 2012, meaning that the currency is worth, as of December 2017, less than one ten-thousandth of what it was worth five years ago, since it has lost 99.99% of its value. The rate at which the value is lost (inflation) is rapidly accelerating. The first time the money took 2 years and 2 months (an implied monthly inflation rate of 9.3%) to lose 90% of its value, the second time 1 year and 10 months (implied rate 11% m/m), the third time only 10 months (implied rate 26% m/m), and the fourth time a mere four months (implied rate 77% m/m).
context_page_description: The Venezuelan economic crisis is the deterioration that began to be noticed in the main macroeconomic indicators from the year 2012, and whose consequences continue, not only economically but also politically and socially. The April 2019 International Monetary Fund World Economic Outlook described Venezuela as being in a "wartime economy". For the fifth consecutive year, Bloomberg rated Venezuela first on its misery index in 2019.
context_section_description: Inflation in Venezuela remained high during Chávez's presidency. By 2010, inflation removed any advancement of wage increases. The inflation rate in 2014 reached 69% and was the highest in the world. It increased to 181% in 2015, 800% in 2016, 4,000% in 2017 and 2,295,981% in February 2019.
  In November 2016, Venezuela entered a period of hyperinflation. The Venezuelan government "essentially stopped" producing inflation estimates in early 2018.
  From 2017 to 2019, some people became video game gold farmers and could be seen playing games such as RuneScape to sell in-game currency or characters for real currency; gamers could make more money than salaried workers by earning only a few dollars per day. In the 2017 Christmas season, some shops stopped using price tags since prices would inflate so quickly.
  In August 2018, Maduro announced a new currency, the sovereign bolívar, to fight hyperinflation. The new currency replaced the existing paper bolivar at a rate of 1/100,000: a 100,000 bolivar note becoming a 1 sovereign bolivar note. The new bills were introduced on 20 August 2018.
  At the end of 2018, inflation had reached 1.35 million percent.
  According to Bloomberg, Venezuela's inflation is expected to reach 8 million percent in 2019, making it the world's most miserable economy. The country continues to top Bloomberg's Misery Index for the fifth year straight.
caption: The value of one US dollar in Venezuelan bolívares fuertes (before 20 August 2018) and soberanos on the black market through time, according to DolarToday.com. Blue and red vertical lines represent every time the currency has lost 90% of its value. This has happened seven times since 2012, meaning that the currency is worth, as of mid-February 2019, 30,000,000 times less than in August 2012, since it has lost more than 99.99999% of its value. The rate at which the value is lost (inflation) is accelerating. The first time the money took 2 years and 2 months to lose 90% of its value, the second time 1 year and 10 months, the third time 10 months, and the most recent time only 3 months.[citation needed]
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