Lucy Barsakhian wrote in “Nidaa Al-Watan”:
In the struggle for survival that the Lebanese are currently waging in the midst of unprecedented financial chaos, many have gained greater voluntariness to deal with the fluctuations in the exchange rate of the dollar, which has moved from a state of daily change to a stage of hysteria. Consequently, many learned ways to circumvent the crisis, so that the profit at a certain moment does not turn into a quick loss, especially since the dollar exchange rate fluctuations by the hour and minute sometimes, have become upward in most cases, and recorded a record speed during the current week, with the dollar exchange rate rising from 50 thousand and 500. Liras at the end of last week to more than sixty thousand pounds until Thursday evening, that is, an increase of regarding ten thousand pounds in less than a week, leaving the impression among most citizens that they are losers.
The description of this reality does not apply only to the merchants of luxuries or non-essential consumer goods, who may be of benefit to them in the stagnation of the economic movement, but its repercussions can be felt, especially among the owners of small shops that sell basic needs, especially foodstuffs, some of which have reached the point of incapacity even in Preserving his capital.
In a quick tour of some of the shops of the small neighborhoods in Zahle, this reality is evident through the mostly empty shelves. As the owners explain that they do not usually have a large capital that allows them to store goods, at least to obtain offers similar to those usually given to major merchants. So the lot they are selling includes all the profit or loss that their trade can bear. Since the fluctuations of the dollar were unprecedented for the owners of these shops, many of them lost their capital when they were selling the piece at a price in order to buy it at a double price later, and therefore the quantities of goods that were present in these shops decreased, so that some of them might not even recover their capital.
Many were late to understand the strategy that must cope with these fluctuations. While some of them were keen from the outset to replace each piece sold with another piece in its place, others discovered that waiting for the market price to remain stable to purchase their needs became an irreparable loss later on. During this period, the agents of the sellers began to devise methods that preserve their customers, especially since their survival is the continuity of their jobs and their commissions as well. So they created WhatsApp groups on which they publish the daily fluctuations in commodity prices, hour by hour, so that the shop owner is not surprised that he sold goods at a price in order to buy them on the same day at a higher price. However, even this collusion between the agent and the owner of the shop did not allow some to avoid losses, and the reality that everyone has to face now is the dollarization of goods. That is, pricing them all in dollars, while leaving the applications busy in determining their prices minute by minute.
One of the shop owners says that dollarization of foodstuffs has become a fait accompli, whether announced or not. He revealed that since the beginning of this week, many wholesalers and companies have priced their goods in dollars, and asked shopkeepers to sell them in dollars or its equivalent at the market exchange rate. This method of calculation, according to shopkeepers, can limit their losses, but it will undoubtedly cause great chaos in the market, and a discrepancy in the selling price, which may be justified sometimes, especially in light of the rapid fluctuations in the price of the dollar. As one of them may buy a piece at a certain price, and return following an hour to buy it at a different price if the price of the dollar increases.
It is remarkable that this willingness to change prices has become a strategy that most self-employed people are trying to adopt. In women’s beauty salons, for example, some have even priced the service provided in dollars. Determining the price in dollars has also become less likely to be heard by some when determining the cost of repairing shoes, clothes, or even electrical appliances and computers. They are all professions that depend on manual skill and may sometimes not involve additional costs. And this infection has spread even to sidewalk cafes, those popular places that people usually choose for their limited cost. Here, one of them tells how the owner of a small cafe in the city of Zahle rushed to contact his assistant as soon as the dollar recorded its first jump during the past week, asking him to raise his prices at the rate of five thousand pounds for each commodity he offers, and this created confusion for his poor assistant, especially when he discovered that one of his customers He only sipped half of the cup he requested at the previous dollar price, so he stood confused regarding the second half, not knowing how he would face the customer on the stock exchange of the pending cup of coffee, as the rest of the Lebanese live at the dollar price.
