Venezuela’s central bank has denied shutting down several international payment systems

Venezuela’s central bank 21st denied news that it planned to deactivate multiple international payment systems, Russian satellite news agency Sputniknews reported.

Venezuela’s central bank and Venezuela’s banking agency’s Regulatory Authority (Sudeban) have decided to develop their own payment systems to stop cooperation agreements with Visa, Mastercard and Maestro by the end of January next year, Banca y Negocios website reported 20th. The debit card business for these payment systems will be discontinued with effect from November 30, 2019 and will no longer be processed with effect from January 30, 2020, the website reported.

Venezuela’s central bank said it was talking about the construction of additional or replacement national technology platforms to achieve payments. “The joint circular issued is not intended to stop international concessions for debit and credit cards,” the communique said.

Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro has said Venezuela will abandon the dollar, although Venezuela’s financial sector has recently almost completely lifted restrictions on the circulation of the dollar. Indeed, the dollarisation of venezuela’s economy has taken place in recent months-starting with the official opening of foreign currencies.

U.S. sanctions against Venezuela have been in effect since March 2015, when US President Barack Obama put a series of Venezuelan officials on the sanctions list in retaliation for Venezuela’s deportation of U.S. diplomats. Since then, sanctions have expanded several times. The United States has recently further strengthened many of its sanctions against the Commission, including against state-owned companies. January 28–the United States announced sanctions against Venezuela’s national oil company.