American Airlines announced that it wrote off $592 million in cash that it was unable to extract from Venezuela on its fourth quarter report. American, as well as other airlines, have been unable to repatriate funds originally collected in Venezuelan currency over the course of the last 3 years. Inflation has reduced the value of the Bolivar to almost zero. However, the government has maintained official conversion rates that are falsely high. With the government of Venezuela is essentially bankrupt, and there is very little hope for foreign businesses to get their money out of the country. After reducing flight capacity to Venezuela 80% in 2014, American Airlines resumed its service between New York City JFK and Caracas last December. American also operates between Miami and the Venezuelan cities of Caracas and Maracaibo. Tickets for all of these flights may be purchased only in US dollars, or other viable foreign currencies.
