Issuing money vote - Why?

Day 704, 06:12 Published in Bolivia Bolivia by Clairobscur

Lo siento, no tenia el tiempo de traducir este articulo en español. Vosotros pueden leer mi thread en el foro del congreso.

I started a law proposal to issue money yesterday. I see that 5 congressmen have voted no even though there has been no comments in the thread I opened on this topic in the congress forum

However, I'm going to explain briefly the reasons why I started this vote. For more details, read the post (http://ebolivia.forums-free.com/intervencion-en-el-mm-imprimir-bobs-t558.html . Sorry, it's in Spanish)

The exchange rate for BOB used to be relatively stable at about 1 BOB = 0.011 gold, with occasional variations to 0.010 or 0.012 gold. The spread (difference between the price of gold paid in BOBs and the price of BOBs paid in gold) was acceptably low (making BOB a not very attractive currency for speculators.

However, due in all likelihood to an attack by speculators (buying all BOBs at a low price in order to sell them later at a high price), the value of the BOB went up to 0.014, then 0.015 and yesterday 0.018 gold. The spread became very large (at the moment, for instance, it's about 22😵, making the BOB an even more attractive currency for speculators (they can sell gold for BOBs then the BOBs for gold and pocket a profit of 22% every time).

A massive (+ 63😵 and sudden change like this in exchange rates in extremely disruptive for the economy of a country. Again, read the thread for more details, but basically, it makes Bolivian products much costlier than foreign products, and that without any adaptation time. That's the reason why almost all countries in eRepublik have a Central Bank regulating the exchange rates and preventing unwilling and sudden changes (there might be good reasons to let the value of a currency rise or fall, or even to cause it, but never as abruptly). They regulate the market by selling large amounts of gold and currency at fixed rates, so reducing the spread and also preventing speculators from "playing" with the currency.

Unfortunately, eBolivia doesn't have such a Central Bank. When I noticed yesterday that we were hitting the absurd rate of 0.018, it became obvious to me that an urgent intervention was required (a normal Central Bank usually would have intervened as soon as the currency would have begun to rise). However, I was informed that the government itself was lacking BOBs and intended to keep them in order to be able to pay salaries in public companies, hence was unlikely to put them on the market.

That's the reason why I immediately started a vote to issue currency. I didn't wait for the debate to unfold, because the matter seemed urgent to me. I proposed the issuing of 3500 BOBs because only 17.5 gold were available in the treasury (issuing a BOB costs 0.005 gold), even though I believe it won't be sufficient, and issuing more currency would be needed. The goal is to sell those 3500 BOBs on the monetary market at a lower exchange rate ( I proposed 0.012 gold in the debate area).

Some might think that this is costing money, or more specifically gold to the government. Not at all. At the contrary, the government will *gain* gold with this operation (and eBolivia lacks gold). Issuing 3500 BOBs costs 17.5 gold, as mentioned. Sold on the Monetary Market at a rate of 0.012 gold, they will bring in 42 gold. That's a profit of 24.5 gold for the government. Only speculators might lose something in the process (of course, there might be speculators amongst the congressmen).

That's why I ask all congressmen to vote "yes" to this proposal, and to the government to use the money issued to regulate the MM. And also to donate more gold to the Bolivian treasury (from governmental organizations) because I believe issuing more BOBs will be necessary, and it's not possible to start another "issue money" vote without gold in the treasury.

I also urge eBolivians to resist the temptation to speculate themselves (for instance, buying BOBs they don't need if they see them at 0.015 to sell them back immediately at 0.017 or similar things.