Hello I'm Simon Long, international editor at The Economist and this is Money Talks on Economist

coming up on today's show, China's giant grain trader and how it's shaking up the Old World Order.

China has realized that it can't grow everything it needs, so to remedy this, it has decided to result to trade.

And yet another controversy facing the market in credit default swaps.

Because no one really expected Vodavones to go to go bust,

no one was looking that closely, that seems to be the expert. really expected Vodavones I go to go bust.

No one was looking that closely.

That seems to be the explanation.

But even so, it is quite an embarrassing mistake to make.

First, how to fix Venezuela, where wheelbarrows of cash are being exchanged for a loaf of bread

and prices are doubling roughly every month. Venezuela is experiencing severe hyper-inflation in what may be the final days of the ill-starred

regime of President Nicholas Maduro.

But given the right sort of regime change, hyper-inflation can end quickly, offering a slither of hope.

To talk about this, I'm joined on the phone by Ryan Avant, the Economist's Free Exchange

columnist.

Hello Ryan.

Hi Simon. Firstly, maybe, let's put this in a historical perspective.

In their history of hyperinflations, which I see you take back to Rome and the Emperor Diocletian,

but many would also think of Weymard, Germany, Shanghai before the revolution.

I mean, how bad is Venezuela's?

Well, it's very bad relative to sort of the lived experience that you and I have, but relative to kind of other

hyper-inflations, it hasn't yet achieved kind of record-breaking territory.

...