Bank of the South

Bank of the South
Company typePublic
IndustryFinance and Development
Founded2009
HeadquartersCaracas

The Bank of the South (Spanish: Banco del Sur, Portuguese: Banco do Sul, Dutch: Bank van het Zuiden) or BancoSur is a monetary fund and lending organization established on 26 September 2009 by Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay, Uruguay, Ecuador, Bolivia and Venezuela with promises of initial capital of US$20 billion. Argentina, Venezuela, and Brazil were to have each pledged $4 billion, and Uruguay, Ecuador, Paraguay and Bolivia were to have contributed smaller amounts.[1][2] The bank intended to lend money to nations in the Americas to construct social programs and infrastructure. Documents establishing the bank as an entity were signed in 2007, and the agreement between the countries was finalized in 2009, but as of 2016, the bank had not been capitalized.[3]

  1. ^ Cite error: The named reference MercoPress1 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  2. ^ Cite error: The named reference bbc was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  3. ^ Mares, David R. and Harold A. Trinkunas (2016). Aspirational Power: Brazil on the Long Road to Global Influence. Brookings Institution Press. ISBN 9780815727965. Chavez made claims about never again having to seek funds from the IMF and having to endure its conditionality programs. Chavez even announced that Venezuela would leave the IMF (it did not, but did refuse to allow it to carry out formal reviews of the Venezuelan economy). ... Although an initial document for the establishment of the bank was signed in December 2007, it took another two years to finalize the agreement creating it. Among the controversial points was the question of voting rights ... The Bank of the South project, however, remains paralyzed six years after its ratification ... as of this writing in February 2016, the Bank of the South is still not capitalized ...