Notes. Short pieces on rates, currencies, commodities and technology, and where I think things are going.

For fourteen years the boliviano has been held at 6.96 per dollar. The reserves that paid for that promise are almost gone, and the bill is now arriving through prices instead of the exchange rate.

Between 2022 and 2025 almost every inflation-targeting economy in the region brought inflation back toward target. The exceptions tell you more about the framework than about the shock.

Chile and Peru sell copper to China. Bolivia sells gas to its neighbours. Since 2015 that difference has shown up in growth, and the lithium story has not changed it yet.