Rampant inflation, yet a steady exchange rate.

[exstasie]

Ask your grandfather, or if you still have one, one of your great grandparents how much was a loaf of bread during the time when they were teenagers.

Wait for the answer.

That's inflation.

I wonder what kind of salary he was getting paid back then. $3,500 a year?

Looking only at purchasing power perverts things a bit. In terms of wages (how far your paycheck goes) it's not nearly as bad as people make out. In fact, technology and globalization has significantly lowered the price of some goods even after we account for inflation.

The real issue is whether you hold your savings in fiat money, which is obviously a terrible idea. Inflation is a tax on savings.

That's actually intentional. Keynesians use inflation as a disincentive against hoarding money, which in turn facilitates economic growth because people have to find ways to spend and invest their money before it loses value.

[hugeblack]

According to what was reported in some local newspapers^[1], the price of the dollar is about 260 Sudanese pounds, which means that the price lost about 42% of its value within 10 days, and speculation continues.
I do not think that what is happening is natural, and according to some news, the speculations that occur in the black market are caused by the fact that some buyers buy in large quantities, so I think that the government is buying dollars from the black market because there are many statements by the Prime Minister who says that the Central Bank does not contain reserves of cash The foreigner.

I think that one of the factors that prompted them to do so was the payment of millions of dollars in damages for the bombings of the United States embassies in Kenya and Tanzania in 1998^[2].


The country is also still on the list of terrorism, and finally the devastating flood of the Nile River with COVID-19 effect.

[1] https://www.sudanakhbar.com/816418
[2] Analyst: Sudan Has No Cash to Pay Damages for 1998 Embassy Bombings

[inoes]

Sudan has often been hit by crises. Early this year there was a food crisis in several important commodities such as the bread crisis, the fuel crisis and transportation. Besides that, the imbalance in the rate of economic growth that occurs in market import inflation.
the government has tried to anticipate it but the steps are still not right. The most important thing is that Sudan should not sell its country's assets so that it still has a chance to rise.

[Wind_FURY]

Ask your grandfather, or if you still have one, one of your great grandparents how much was a loaf of bread during the time when they were teenagers.

Wait for the answer.

That's inflation.

I wonder what kind of salary he was getting paid back then. $3,500 a year?

Looking only at purchasing power perverts things a bit. In terms of wages (how far your paycheck goes) it's not nearly as bad as people make out. In fact, technology and globalization has significantly lowered the price of some goods even after we account for inflation.

BUT it IS bad as people make out. In most regions of the world, the salaries of people doesn't keep up with the rising prices of goods and services. Why do you think more and more people go below the poverty line every year? The gap between rich and poor has been wider and wider.

The real issue is whether you hold your savings in fiat money, which is obviously a terrible idea. Inflation is a tax on savings.

That's actually intentional. Keynesians use inflation as a disincentive against hoarding money, which in turn facilitates economic growth because people have to find ways to spend and invest their money before it loses value.

Intentional to control the monetary supply to make plebs like us poor, and make us believe that it is OK. Haha.

[jademaxsuy]

This is the usual problem of every country especially now that we are facing in pandemic. Most country resort to printing a lot of money however in return the value of money will depreciate and its buying capacity will be lesser. When it comes to exchange rate which you mean is steady and if we will going to analyze that exchange rate must also be in line with the inflation rate of that said country. This is one of the risk to consider when one is doing currency exchange. The choice to exchange to a different currency must be through indicative study for movement of currency value.

[jostorres]

It is unsustainable just like everyone said, when a country continues to have high inflation, dollar will eventually become a lot more valuable, it is just about how many people in there who have dollars or who can afford to buy dollars. Let me give an example from bitcoin world and we can understand a lot better.

Let's say you live in a nation that is not using dollars, basically almost any other nation than USA, and you have your local exchange which deals with bitcoin to fiat and vice versa, and bitcoin price went up in dollars, became 15k, if there are not enough volume in that local exchange you use and someone sells a ton of bitcoins to drop the price, as long as there is nobody to keep buying for arbitrage reasons, they will not be capable of changing the price, so you would have a local exchange with 10k bitcoin price whereas everywhere else has 15k.

[NotATether]

Ask your grandfather, or if you still have one, one of your great grandparents how much was a loaf of bread during the time when they were teenagers.

Wait for the answer.

That's inflation.

I wonder what kind of salary he was getting paid back then. $3,500 a year?

Looking only at purchasing power perverts things a bit. In terms of wages (how far your paycheck goes) it's not nearly as bad as people make out. In fact, technology and globalization has significantly lowered the price of some goods even after we account for inflation.

The real issue is whether you hold your savings in fiat money, which is obviously a terrible idea. Inflation is a tax on savings.

That's actually intentional. Keynesians use inflation as a disincentive against hoarding money, which in turn facilitates economic growth because people have to find ways to spend and invest their money before it loses value.

Eh, as recent as 2 years ago you could get a few loafs of bread like 20 SDG, today it's like 8 times as that. I don't have a grandfather around, but salaries were pretty normal pre-2018 protests, my dad's job was making like $3200 a month in SDG in 2014.

I like the idea of more markets to import goods from, because it makes foreign suppliers compete with each other to sell at the lowest price. And despite sanctions there's still a swarm of far-east suppliers for Sudan in China and Hong Kong.

According to this chart, the exchange rate was quite normal a few years ago, except for an oddity at the end of 2016 for which I have no explanation (could be a political event?)

According to what was reported in some local newspapers^[1], the price of the dollar is about 260 Sudanese pounds, which means that the price lost about 42% of its value within 10 days, and speculation continues.
I do not think that what is happening is natural, and according to some news, the speculations that occur in the black market are caused by the fact that some buyers buy in large quantities, so I think that the government is buying dollars from the black market because there are many statements by the Prime Minister who says that the Central Bank does not contain reserves of cash The foreigner.

I think that one of the factors that prompted them to do so was the payment of millions of dollars in damages for the bombings of the United States embassies in Kenya and Tanzania in 1998^[2].


The country is also still on the list of terrorism, and finally the devastating flood of the Nile River with COVID-19 effect.

[1] https://www.sudanakhbar.com/816418
[2] Analyst: Sudan Has No Cash to Pay Damages for 1998 Embassy Bombings

So apparently stores are stopping selling their stuff because of the price hike overnight. I hope this exchange rate hike is only temporary, because stores take a few days to adapt to the new prices and if this persists, things here will become even more expensive.

I still experience floods like that once in a blue moon, because here, when it rains it pours. I've personally seen whole streets and walkways flooded with muddy water, and nobody is there to dry it up. The floods aren't as bad where I live, I heard it's worse in some areas of the city.

I also heard they are getting an ambassador to the US. I hope he can manage to convince them to remove them from the state sponsors of terrorism list because if they do, all the trade barriers between US companies and Sudan will be overcome, and the country will be in better shape with fresh new trade.

[exstasie]

I wonder what kind of salary he was getting paid back then. $3,500 a year?

Looking only at purchasing power perverts things a bit. In terms of wages (how far your paycheck goes) it's not nearly as bad as people make out. In fact, technology and globalization has significantly lowered the price of some goods even after we account for inflation.

BUT it IS bad as people make out. In most regions of the world, the salaries of people doesn't keep up with the rising prices of goods and services. Why do you think more and more people go below the poverty line every year? The gap between rich and poor has been wider and wider.

We need to get more specific. I'm assuming you're talking about developing or emerging markets?

In North America, what you're saying has been true for the last ~20 years. Wages have stagnated and diverged from GDP growth since 2000 or so. That certainly was not true in the preceding generations going back to the 1920s or whatever, which is what I was referring to.

The real issue is whether you hold your savings in fiat money, which is obviously a terrible idea. Inflation is a tax on savings.

That's actually intentional. Keynesians use inflation as a disincentive against hoarding money, which in turn facilitates economic growth because people have to find ways to spend and invest their money before it loses value.

Intentional to control the monetary supply to make plebs like us poor, and make us believe that it is OK. Haha.

I don't think so. It's an attempt to prevent depressions and curb recessions. Fed policy may be misguided and may end up imploding the economy one day but I don't buy into those kinds of conspiracy theories. It's pretty well known if you have savings, you shouldn't keep it in cash. That's the whole point of retirement accounts; they get invested into the market.

[Wind_FURY]

I wonder what kind of salary he was getting paid back then. $3,500 a year?

Looking only at purchasing power perverts things a bit. In terms of wages (how far your paycheck goes) it's not nearly as bad as people make out. In fact, technology and globalization has significantly lowered the price of some goods even after we account for inflation.

BUT it IS bad as people make out. In most regions of the world, the salaries of people doesn't keep up with the rising prices of goods and services. Why do you think more and more people go below the poverty line every year? The gap between rich and poor has been wider and wider.

We need to get more specific. I'm assuming you're talking about developing or emerging markets?

In North America, what you're saying has been true for the last ~20 years. Wages have stagnated and diverged from GDP growth since 2000 or so. That certainly was not true in the preceding generations going back to the 1920s or whatever, which is what I was referring to.

I'm saying in general. Wouldn't you agree that he gap between the rich and the poor is greater than 100 years ago? Plus there's a growing, and growing percentage of people going under the poverty line every 10 years.

The real issue is whether you hold your savings in fiat money, which is obviously a terrible idea. Inflation is a tax on savings.

That's actually intentional. Keynesians use inflation as a disincentive against hoarding money, which in turn facilitates economic growth because people have to find ways to spend and invest their money before it loses value.

Intentional to control the monetary supply to make plebs like us poor, and make us believe that it is OK. Haha.

I don't think so. It's an attempt to prevent depressions and curb recessions. Fed policy may be misguided and may end up imploding the economy one day but I don't buy into those kinds of conspiracy theories. It's pretty well known if you have savings, you shouldn't keep it in cash. That's the whole point of retirement accounts; they get invested into the market.

It's also an attempt to bail out the banksters like in the U.S. subprime mortgage crisis. It was also the tax payers who are suffering because they are the last to access all that printed money.

[wxa7115]

And yet, the USD/SDG exchange rate is stuck at 55 since Feburary (and I also felt my share of price hikes when that happened). Doesn't inflation also cause exchange rates to increase, in an inflationary way?

What?

Head explode.

Ask your grandfather, or if you still have one, one of your great grandparents how much was a loaf of bread during the time when they were teenagers.

Wait for the answer.

That's inflation.

It is really that simple, some people want to do some complex formulas in order to try to tell what has been inflation during a period of time, but the truth is you only need to look for a person that has lived for a very long time and ask him if he remembers the price of a product back then and you will know your answer.

Inflation is not complex, it happens because of an increase in the money supply and governments have tried to make it seem as if this is a good thing in low amounts, but the problem is that they can never maintain those low amounts and then we have rampant inflation, people cannot afford the services and products that they did before and the economy finally collapses.

[LoyceV]

I ordered a few boxes of pizza today, and the total bill was 3200 SDG.

That's 9% of the average monthly salary (36,500 SDG), so I guess most people can't afford to order this.

The country’s currency recently fell to a record low of 150 Sudanese pounds to the dollar on the black market, compared with 55 at the official rate.

How does that work? I take it you can't just buy dollars at the official exchange rate? If that's the case, than what's the point of having it?

A quick search on the usual Dutch websites for currency exchange shows no hits for buying or selling SDG.

[Upgrade00]

How does that work? I take it you can't just buy dollars at the official exchange rate? If that's the case, than what's the point of having it?

From what I understand, No, regular individuals are not offered the official rate. It is also called the interbank or mid-market rate;
• Interbank cause, it is mostly used when banks are exchanging money among themselves or similar high volume transactions.
• Mid-market cause, it is the average between the buy and sell price.

If a regular individual wanted to buy USD, banks would charge a higher rate than what they sell at.
Banks also use markups, which are extra cost on the purchase of a currency. The percentage markup of a bank is usually not public.

The official rate is highly regulated to control the perceived state of an economy and avoid reflecting the rate of a crisis, that may one of the points of having it. Such regulation is not present in the black market.

[barbara44]

I have seen "gram of gold" price check for peoples income and specially the minimum salary because that is the most important salary in every nation, if you check who makes how much the people who make minimum salary is the biggest group in every nation.

So, this means check how many grams of gold someone could have bought with their entire minimum salary 50 years ago, 40 years ago, 30 years ago, 20 years ago, 10 years ago and today.

If you check those numbers you will see the real inflation, you are capable of buying less and less gold with the money you make from minimum salary which means all other salaries as well. Life is sooooo much harder today economically compared to older generation but what they are missing out is the fact that people who are 50+ will die soon and people under 50 lived this horrible life, which they will help to fix in the future.

[Harlot]

I can't blame FOREX traders on shorting your currency bro. With the cues of seeing the government doing a bad job with your economy and printing more banknotes that are just signs that they should drop your currency. I as an investor would do the same thing if I am holding your currency in one of my portfolio, I won't hold and speculate that the price will improve because I know for a fact that the price will go down because of the situation. Traders will be traders and they aren't the ones to blame here.

[exstasie]

I don't think so. It's an attempt to prevent depressions and curb recessions. Fed policy may be misguided and may end up imploding the economy one day but I don't buy into those kinds of conspiracy theories. It's pretty well known if you have savings, you shouldn't keep it in cash. That's the whole point of retirement accounts; they get invested into the market.

It's also an attempt to bail out the banksters like in the U.S. subprime mortgage crisis. It was also the tax payers who are suffering because they are the last to access all that printed money.

The 2008 crisis was more about fiscal policy and relief than the Fed, and on paper TARP wasn't even that bad. Failing bank executives walked away with fat bonuses sure, but when all was said and done and the TARP loans were paid back, the government ended up profiting.

What's currently happening actually pisses me off more. People bitch and moan about poor people getting handouts, but it's middle class homeowners who really get all the handouts. They already get tax subsidies out the wazoo, now they're getting 6-12 months complete deferment on mortgages (probably more coming down the road too) while poor people at best are racking up debt if they can't pay the rent. Not to mention the insane overpayments for unemployment benefits.

The primary reason the Fed is propping up the stock and housing markets is to bail out the middle class, whose entire net worth is generally held in their house and the stock market via retirement accounts. It's not just for the rich. It's to entrench and secure the wealth of everyone but the working class and poor, who don't own anything. The system is set up to subsidize capital and property owners, same as it ever was. Let's not pretend this is about the 99% vs. the 1%, or bankers vs. everyone else.

[hugeblack]

.
I also heard they are getting an ambassador to the US.

It won't make a difference, believe me, Sudan will not be removed from the list *at least for now.* I have heard that Sudan should pay the victims of September 11, even though the country has nothing to do with these attacks.

I ordered a few boxes of pizza today, and the total bill was 3200 SDG.

That's 9% of the average monthly salary (36,500 SDG), so I guess most people can't afford to order this.

How does that work? I take it you can't just buy dollars at the official exchange rate? If that's the case, than what's the point of having it?

It is an accounting number that enables the state to prepare the balance and determine its tax and customs value based on it.
Note that it is easy to sell the dollar in Sudan and you can sell at the central bank but the exchange rate is very low against what you can get in the black market so tourists and expatriates prefer to deal with the black market.

[LoyceV]

Note that it is easy to sell the dollar in Sudan and you can sell at the central bank but the exchange rate is very low against what you can get in the black market so tourists and expatriates prefer to deal with the black market.

What if it's the other way around: can you sell your SDG back to the central bank for dollars before you leave the country? I guess you can't, otherwise the black market sellers would get rich.

Just a hypothetical question, I'm not going to Sudan (or anywhere else) as a tourist any time soon.

[NotATether]

Note that it is easy to sell the dollar in Sudan and you can sell at the central bank but the exchange rate is very low against what you can get in the black market so tourists and expatriates prefer to deal with the black market.

What if it's the other way around: can you sell your SDG back to the central bank for dollars before you leave the country? I guess you can't, otherwise the black market sellers would get rich.

Just a hypothetical question, I'm not going to Sudan (or anywhere else) as a tourist any time soon.

I never did that process before, but they'd probably request for your financial documents before you can exchange a substantial amount of SDG for dollars. I mean, they aren't going to just let people on the black market exchange a ton of SDG, those traders would get in deep trouble if they did that. But on the other hand there is a legitimate need for people to convert their SDG to other currencies for business purposes.

Probably the most feasible way to withdraw cash is if you get it from your bank account, and then exchange it for dollars p2p. Al Baraka Bank let's you withdraw up to 2,000 SDG at once, five times a day (so ~$180 USD, you can't use it to siphon thousands of USD at once, which makes sense, because there is a shortage of dollars). I found no such web page for Bank of Khartoum you can wire cash via Western Union. I don't know the transfer limit of that though.

[wxa7115]

The 2008 crisis was more about fiscal policy and relief than the Fed, and on paper TARP wasn't even that bad. Failing bank executives walked away with fat bonuses sure, but when all was said and done and the TARP loans were paid back, the government ended up profiting.

What's currently happening actually pisses me off more. People bitch and moan about poor people getting handouts, but it's middle class homeowners who really get all the handouts. They already get tax subsidies out the wazoo, now they're getting 6-12 months complete deferment on mortgages (probably more coming down the road too) while poor people at best are racking up debt if they can't pay the rent. Not to mention the insane overpayments for unemployment benefits.

The primary reason the Fed is propping up the stock and housing markets is to bail out the middle class, whose entire net worth is generally held in their house and the stock market via retirement accounts. It's not just for the rich. It's to entrench and secure the wealth of everyone but the working class and poor, who don't own anything. The system is set up to subsidize capital and property owners, same as it ever was. Let's not pretend this is about the 99% vs. the 1%, or bankers vs. everyone else.

Governments have cornered themselves and politicians think they have no choice but bail out the middle class, after all it is known that when a huge economic crisis strikes the most affected of all is the middle class, the rich will keep being rich after the crisis since most likely they have businesses that produce value and positive cash flow and ways to store value like real state, precious metals, jewelry or works of art. Those that are poor while they do suffer because of an economic crisis they had little or nothing to begin with so their living standards are not as affected.

But the middle class goes from having many comforts to become poor because as you say most of their wealth is on their houses and that for the most part are not even paid off, so if they were to lose their place of residence they will lose all of those payments made over the years and most likely they will lose their jobs at the same time making them desperate in the process, and when you add that the US is in the middle of a political campaign to elect the next president it is obvious Trump will do everything in his power to avoid the collapse of the middle class or he will have no chance on the next elections.

[jaysabi]

What's currently happening actually pisses me off more. People bitch and moan about poor people getting handouts, but it's middle class homeowners who really get all the handouts. They already get tax subsidies out the wazoo, now they're getting 6-12 months complete deferment on mortgages (probably more coming down the road too) while poor people at best are racking up debt if they can't pay the rent. Not to mention the insane overpayments for unemployment benefits.

The primary reason the Fed is propping up the stock and housing markets is to bail out the middle class, whose entire net worth is generally held in their house and the stock market via retirement accounts. It's not just for the rich. It's to entrench and secure the wealth of everyone but the working class and poor, who don't own anything. The system is set up to subsidize capital and property owners, same as it ever was. Let's not pretend this is about the 99% vs. the 1%, or bankers vs. everyone else.

That's ridiculous. You think the middle class is reaping all the benefits of bailouts?  The middle class owns comparatively very little of the assets that are being propped up by the Fed.  When the Fed props up the stock market, guess who gets the gains?  The rich.  The top 10% own 84% of the US stock market:
 https://money.com/stock-ownership-10-percent-richest/  To the extent the middle class gets anything at all, it's tangential to the looting going on by the wealthy.  The idea that the Fed is intending to bail out the middle class is pure fiction.  It's about the rich.  Always has been, and certainly still is.