Airplanes in cash travel from Russia to Venezuela

Hundreds of millions of dollars in cash have been sent from Russia to Venezuela, a lifeline for the country of South America, which has limited access to the global financial system under US sanctions.

A total of US $ 315 million between dollars and euros was sent in six separate expeditions from Moscow to Caracas from May 2018 to April 2019, according to data reviewed by Bloomberg of ImportGenius, which compiled Russian customs data obtained from private sources. The money comes from lenders managed by the governments of the countries and its destination was the development bank of Venezuela, according to the archives.

Although the money can be used for all kinds of things – repatriation of Venezuelan money abroad, dividends of a stake in a Moscow bank or income from the sale of crude or gold – this logistical feat complex of how the president's administration Nicolás Maduro tried to avoid the aggressive financial sanctions of the United States Following this scrutiny, the central bank now carries out more cash transactions and sometimes offers local customers access in euros.

ImportGenius data goes until April of this year. This month, about 97 million US dollars were sent to the Venezuelan Economic and Social Development Bank, called Bands, by Moscow-based bank Evrofinance Mosnarbank. Evrofinance is a partnership between Bandes and the State Real Estate Management Agency of Russia.

In January, the equivalent of 113 million US dollars in 100 euro notes had been sent by the state lender Gazprombank, which then held a stake in Evrofinance. The same entity had sent $ 50 million just two days earlier and two separate unspecified foreign currency deliveries had been made for a total of $ 55 million in May and July of last year.

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A press officer from Evrofinance did not respond to a request for comment. Requests made to the gangs through the Venezuelan Ministry of Economy were redirected to the Ministry of Information, which did not respond.

An official of the Venezuelan government, who asked not to be identified because the issue was delicate, confirmed that the country had received shipments related to Evrofinance, but declined to comment further.

Anton TrifonovGazprombank spokesman declined to comment on the remittances, but said that "the corresponding Bands account with Gazprombank, as well as any cooperation between banks, was completely canceled in March 2019".

The Venezuelan regime has made every effort to maintain access to the strong currency since the US crackdown. it isolates from conventional financial systems and major banks refuse to do business with Maduro. Among other things, the regime has resorted to the secret sale of gold to raise funds, while studying the possibility of using cryptocurrency or a global payment system administered by Russia to send money. l & # 39; money.

The United States sanctioned Bands in March, alleging that Maduro was using the bank's accounts to keep a significant amount of money abroad, mostly in Europe. Officials said the Venezuelan government had begun withdrawing funds from the central bank for transfer to Bande.

Last year, the Maduro government chose Evrofinance to manage certain payments to its suppliers, who were invited to channel international transactions via the Moscow bank. Later that year, Venezuela appointed a former member of Evrofinance's board as senior manager of the country's banking system.