Goldman Sachs’ Role In The Venezuelan Political Crisis
Goldman Sachs’ Role In The Venezuelan Political Crisis
Goldman Sachs has found itself at the center of Venezuela’s political crisis.
The bank tried to keep secret its purchase of $2.8 billion worth of bonds from PDVSA, the Venezuelan state-owned oil company. The pennies-on-the-dollar acquisition resulted in a fierce response from open government and human rights advocates. They accuse President Nicolas Maduro’s government of using the funds to purchase weapons for deadly crackdowns on his political opposition.
We talk about the unrest and the failure of regional powers to mediate peace with David Smilde, senior fellow at the Washington Office on Latin America (WOLA). He’s curator of WOLA’s Venezuelan Politics and Human Rights blog and co-authored the edited volume, Venezuela’s Bolivarian Democracy: Participation, Politics and Culture under Chávez.