He American dollar fell again to 300 Cuban pesos (CUP) on the island’s informal market.
In line with its downward trend in recent weeks, the US currency lost five pesos in value in the last 24 hours, according to the independent media’s rate The touchcalculated —as explained by the publication itself— based on the purchase and sale proposals on digital platforms.
The dollar has thus returned to the three hundred CUP barrier on Friday morning, just as it did at the end of May, after a sharp fall that took it to 280 pesos just days later.
However, a drastic change in trend made it rise rapidly and reach around 400 pesos in the second week of June. But, from that moment on, a new decline began, slower and with fluctuations, until reaching its current value.
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In line with this fluctuation, the euro and the MLC have also remained on the decline in recent weeks, although at times their value changes have not always been identical to those of the dollar and the MLC even managed to show stability above 300 pesos for several days.
However, at dawn on Friday, both currencies were quoted on the informal Cuban market at 315 and 270 CUP, after a drop of five pesos each compared to the previous day.
The 300 pesos barrier
The US currency reached and surpassed the 300 pesos threshold for the first time last February, amid a sustained rise since the beginning of the year. At that time, the euro was quoted at around 305 CUP and the MLC at 260.
From then on, the dollar continued to grow, at times also rapidly, until it reached almost 400 CUP and then suddenly began to fall.
In other words, in just over three months the US currency jumped forward by around 100 pesos and experienced a rapid decline of around 120, which brought it back below 300.
However, less than a week later it was back at that figure and from there it would continue to rise until, after peaks and fluctuations, it fell back to where it is now.
Government acknowledges that it must partially dollarize its economy so that the peso can “recover”
Is it going up or down?
In a quick retrospective exercise, it is enough to remember that the dollar started 2024 in the informal market at 265 CUP.
Also, last year it remained above 200 CUP since June, although it experienced movements that brought it to around 250, then fell in September to 215 and then recovered from that point.
Previously, in October 2022, it had reached the 200 pesos barrier for the first time, although on that occasion it did not hold and remained below that threshold for several months.
If the current trend continues, the dollar could continue to fall below 300 pesos, a likely scenario given its most recent performance.
However, after its more or less rapid swings in recent months, it is difficult to predict what will happen both in the short term and in a more distant time horizon.
The impact of the country’s depressed economic situation and the sustained wave of migration cannot be ignored in the evolution of the value of currencies, nor can the impact of government measures that condition the use of currencies by Cubans in one way or another.
On the one hand, the authorities capped prices and eliminated customs duties on several products and, on the other hand – as reported in the National Assembly – they aim to charge private imports in foreign currencies and to further dollarize the country.
