I am going to try to explain something I always have a hard time explaining. We Venezuelans can not go to a regular exchange and get any currency like people do in almost any other country. There is an exchange control forced by the government and to be able to get any other currency we would have to “apply” to the government, (as you were applying for a university or anything else), and expect that they approve your solicitude. But of course the probabilities are very low; so it is extremely difficult for a regular person or a regular company to get the currency they need. Imagine what that does to companies in this global world where it might need to buy let's say, rice from india, and oats from canada for a grain cereal the company produces. Or what that does to people that might need to travel to another country for any reason. So, as hard as it is to get this Dollars, (US dollars are the only currency we can apply for), it is only natural that there exist a black market.
This black market price is of course “illegal”, though everybody refers to it, and is the only real way to get dollars. 1 Dollar in Black Market cost at this moment 8.500 Bolivares. (Bolivares is our official currency). Official government price for one dollar runs about 2700 Bolivares, so there is a spread of 300% between black market and official market. To make things even more complicated, there is another official dollar price set to cost 10 Bolivares, !! 850 times cheaper than black market price !!!) Can you imagine the power this exchange control directives have? They decide who gets this extremely cheap dollars !!, can you imagine the corruption behind it? Of course you could guess who is getting the majority these dollars; family members of government officials!!, newly created companies from friends of the government officials!!, etc. They run the most profitable corruption scheme there is in the world, to buy 1 dollar at 10 bolivares and sell the next day at 8500 bolivares. This is destroying our economy; it creates so many incentives for corruption and distorts all goods prices and quality of living of Venezuelan people.