On the streets of the Island, the conviction grows that there will be no breaks on the rise of the US currency
14ymedio, Yoani Sánchez, Generation Y, Havana, 11 June 2024 — Like in those movies where the main character is injured, rolls in the mud and then gets up to say “it was nothing, just a scratch,” the dollar has begun to recover in the Cuban informal market after a fall that has lasted just a couple of weeks. On the streets of the Island, the conviction is growing that the stumble has only been to gain momentum and that there will be no breaks on the rise of the US currency.
At the beginning of the month of May, the dollar, or the fula as it is popularly referred to, reached close to 400 Cuban pesos in the clandestine currency purchase and sale networks. That figure, in addition to being unprecedented, revealed the weakness of salaries on the Island, where a health professional, with a specialty under their belt, barely earns the equivalent of less than 50 dollars per month. Nor did a drop in the value of what is also called, ironically, “the enemy’s currency,” mean a moderation in the prices of basic products.
Those who receive dollars from abroad held their breath and their wallets to avoid selling their currencies on the days when ‘the green’ experienced a fall
Those who receive dollars from abroad held their breath and their wallets to avoid selling their currencies on the days when ‘the green’ experienced a fall. But those who live only on a salary in national currency could not enjoy the fact that the bill with the face of George Washington could be exchanged for less than 350 pesos. No private business, of those that have begun to spread across the Island and which mainly offer imported foods, lowered the prices of their merchandise. No collective taxi driver, fruit and vegetable merchant, or produce hauler