Re:Russia suspends foreign currency sales
by kragen on Tuesday March 08, 2022 @11:01PM
(#30610789)
We limited bank account withdrawals here in Argentina in 02001; it was called the corralito and affected withdrawals in domestic currency too: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corralito
At the time Argentina's peso was pegged to the US dollar: 1 peso was 1 dollar, but the central bank was bleeding its reserves dry to support that peg, a peg which had destroyed much of Argentina's domestic productive economy over the previous decade but halted hyperinflation.
After a couple of months the government dropped the peg and confiscated the dollar holdings of every bank account, replacing them with pesos at almost the old 1:1 official rate (1.4:1). Overnight the peso fell to just over a quarter dollar, so everybody lost three quarters of their dollar-denominated deposits. But the central bank suddenly had a lot of dollar reserves!
It probably won't work out in exactly the same way in Russia. But some similar things may happen.
If I were in Russia right now I'd want to make sure a substantial percentage of my savings were in Bitcoin or gold.
At the time Argentina's peso was pegged to the US dollar: 1 peso was 1 dollar, but the central bank was bleeding its reserves dry to support that peg, a peg which had destroyed much of Argentina's domestic productive economy over the previous decade but halted hyperinflation.
After a couple of months the government dropped the peg and confiscated the dollar holdings of every bank account, replacing them with pesos at almost the old 1:1 official rate (1.4:1). Overnight the peso fell to just over a quarter dollar, so everybody lost three quarters of their dollar-denominated deposits. But the central bank suddenly had a lot of dollar reserves!
It probably won't work out in exactly the same way in Russia. But some similar things may happen.
If I were in Russia right now I'd want to make sure a substantial percentage of my savings were in Bitcoin or gold.