The IMF Counted Votes on Venezuela. Britain Uses a Different Rule

Multilateral Finance

Key Facts

—The decision. On April 16 the Fund resumed dealings with Caracas, guided by members holding a majority of total voting power.

—The holdings. Venezuela’s reserve tranche and drawing rights total roughly $4.9bn, about SDR 3.6bn.

—The draw. Caracas announced an initial $200m for reconstruction, roughly four percent of the total.

—The follower. The World Bank resumed the same day, saying it was guided by the outcome of the Fund’s polling process.

—The holdout. Britain still declines recognition, so 31 tonnes of gold worth about $1.95bn stay in London.

—The context. The June 24 earthquakes killed 3,811 people, with damage assessed at $37bn.

The Venezuela IMF question was never settled in a courtroom. It was settled by counting votes, and the answer arrived in April.

This week Caracas asked the world to unfreeze its money. The requests went to three different places, and the reason they get three different answers is worth understanding.

Interim president Delcy Rodríguez wrote to King Charles about gold held in London. Foreign minister Yván Gil asked United Nations members to release blocked accounts held in various countries.

The third pot needed no letter. It was already open.

How the Venezuela IMF freeze ended

Venezuela’s access to its holdings at the Fund had been suspended since 2019, when Washington and its allies recognised Juan Guaidó and the institution declined to rule on who governed. The money sat there for seven years.

Then the Fund did something unusual. According to its own announcement on April 16, Kristalina Georgieva declared the Fund was now dealing with the Rodríguez administration, guided by members representing a majority of total voting power.

That phrasing points to a canvass of the membership rather than a legal finding. The World Bank, following the same day, called it the Fund’s polling process.

The World Bank moved the same day and made its reasoning explicit. It said it was guided by the outcome of the Fund’s polling process, and noted its last loan to Venezuela closed in 2005.

What Caracas can actually reach

The sums are larger than the gold everyone is arguing about. Venezuela’s reserve tranche position and drawing rights together come to roughly four point nine billion dollars, on the Fund’s own figures.

That is two and a half times the bullion sitting under Threadneedle Street. It is also the money nobody is writing letters about, because the freeze on it lifted four months ago.

Rodríguez said the day after the earthquakes that Venezuela would create a reconstruction fund using resources held at the Fund, starting with two hundred million dollars. That is about four percent of what it holds.

The Fund has not confirmed the mechanics. Pressed at a briefing on the twenty-fifth of June about whether the money would come from drawing rights, when it would arrive, and whether Georgieva had spoken to Rodríguez, the spokeswoman Julie Kozack said she had little to add so soon after the disaster.

Three custodians, three doctrines

Set the three requests side by side and the pattern is clear. Each institution asks a different question about the same government, and each gets a different answer.

The Fund asks what its members think, weighted by quota, and the members said yes. The World Bank asks what the Fund decided, and followed.

The Bank of England asks something else entirely. A ruling by Britain’s Supreme Court in 2021 tied access to whichever government London recognises, and London has not recognised this one.

So the gold is not frozen by sanctions. It is frozen because Britain declined to take the vote that the Fund took, and its own courts have made that refusal binding on the vault.

What the Venezuela IMF opening means for investors

Reengagement matters far beyond the drawing rights. A full assessment of the Venezuelan economy, the first in around two decades, is now possible, and a sovereign restructuring normally rests on exactly such an assessment.

Venezuela owes something in the region of one hundred and seventy billion dollars across defaulted bonds, loans and arbitration awards. Bondholders have been buying on the expectation that a deal becomes possible once the Fund is back in the room.

Set against the earthquake, the arithmetic stays sobering. The Fund holdings and the London gold together would cover under a fifth of the thirty-seven billion dollars of assessed damage.

What they would comfortably cover is the emergency. The United Nations relief appeal is short by six hundred and twenty-seven million dollars, a figure the Fund holdings alone exceed nearly eight times over.

Can Venezuela access its IMF money now?

Yes, since the Fund resumed dealings with the Rodríguez government on April 16, restoring access to holdings worth roughly four point nine billion dollars. Caracas has announced an initial two hundred million dollar draw for earthquake reconstruction, though the Fund has not detailed the mechanics.

Why is the London gold still frozen then?

Because a different rule applies. The Fund polled its member states and a voting majority accepted the Rodríguez administration, whereas the Bank of England is bound by a British court doctrine that follows the United Kingdom government’s own recognition, which has not been granted.

Does this make a debt restructuring likelier?

It removes a large obstacle, since sovereign restructurings usually depend on an IMF assessment of what debt level is sustainable, and no such assessment has been possible for around twenty years. Venezuela’s external obligations are estimated near one hundred and seventy billion dollars.