The rate of elToque is not perfect, but where is the alternative?

The recent exchange between the independent media elTOQUE and Carlos Miguel Pérez Reyes, president of the Mipyme Dofleini and member of the National Assembly, has reignited a central debate in the Cuban economy: who truly determines the value of the dollar in a country where the State has failed to maintain a functional official exchange market.

If the elTOQUE rate is as imperfect as the deputy claims, why is there no better alternative?

The deputy accused elTOQUE of manipulating its reference rate through a methodology he described as “unreasonable,” which was based on buying and selling intentions derived from social media, biases on the part of sellers, and calculations that, according to him, any first-year engineering student could improve. elTOQUE responded by dismantling conceptual errors in those criticisms, particularly regarding the statistical median, and defending the legitimacy of its model. However, focusing on that technical exchange obscures the real question that defines this debate: if elTOQUE's rate is as imperfect as the deputy claims, why is there no better alternative?

The answer is simple yet devastating: the Cuban state does not provide a credible alternative. And so, in the absence of a functioning official market, the elTOQUE rate has become the de facto reference point for thousands of Cubans—self-employed individuals, private importers, businesses, and families. Not because it is perfect, but because it is the only compass available in a country where the official rate is not upheld, does not reflect reality, and is not supported by a real supply of dollars. That gap is political and economic, not mathematical.

Of course, the exchange rate from elTOQUE has limitations that should not be overlooked. Its methodology is based on public announcements and messages on social media, which means it measures declared intentions, not actual transactions. At certain times, some of these announcements come from individuals interested in selling currencies at the highest possible price, which introduces a clear bias on the part of sellers. Access to the data depends on the reach of bots operating on specific platforms, such as Facebook, Telegram, and Revolico, which does not necessarily capture all market activity.

These are real flaws, and acknowledging them is part of analytical honesty. However, even with those limitations, the elTOQUE rate serves an essential function because the State has practically relinquished its responsibility to provide a reliable, transparent, and operational currency exchange system.

In his response, the deputy presented a more detailed vision of what, in his opinion, a serious currency exchange market should be: fintech platforms, electronic auctions, digital wallets, auditable statistics, and operations based on real transactions. On paper, it is a modern, sophisticated program that is perfectly aligned with global trends.

The real problem of Cuba:

The problem is that this model is impossible to implement in present-day Cuba because the state lacks the necessary resources to sustain it. For an official exchange market to function, something fundamental is required: real dollars. Dollars are needed to sell, dollars to intervene if the rate skyrockets, dollars to maintain convertibility, and dollars for citizens to exchange CUP for foreign currency without uncertainty. The Cuban state does not have those resources and lacks the capacity to generate them in the short term. Therefore, any official rate announced without backing ultimately becomes an accounting fiction.

In addition to the lack of reserves, the State faces another decisive obstacle: it no longer controls the foreign currency flowing into the country. For a long time, remittances were its main source of fresh dollars, but today, less than 10% of those remittances go through official channels, according to figures acknowledged by the government itself. The rest flows to alternative operators, informal networks, and platforms that operate outside the state system. For a government that needs dollars to sustain its currency, losing control of these inflows is equivalent to losing the central lever of its exchange rate policy. No official market can function if the State is unable to capture the foreign currency circulating within its borders.

The problem, however, is not just about reservations: it’s about trust.

The problem, however, is not just about reserves: it’s about trust. The Cuban population does not trust the State's financial institutions, and this distrust has been built over decades of account freezes, abrupt restrictions, rule changes without notice, arbitrary limits, excessive controls, and transfer blockages. In an ironic but extremely revealing twist, many citizens believe that the informal market is more predictable and stable than the official one. An economy can change through decrees, but trust does not. And as long as the State remains lacking in credibility, no centralized exchange system will work.

These limitations are compounded by the fact that the Cuban economy does not generate enough foreign currency to sustain a viable foreign exchange market. Exports are insufficient, tourism remains depressed, foreign investment is minimal, and domestic production is at historically low levels. Without a steady flow of dollars from productive sectors, any attempt to stabilize the currency will be fleeting.

The country's monetary policy also contributes to the deterioration of the system: the State finances its deficit by printing more CUP without backing, which further devalues the currency and makes it impossible to maintain any stable rate. This is compounded by the chaotic fragmentation of the official Cuban economic system: CUC, MLC, foreign currency cards, special stores, GAESA, which operate with extractive logics and multiply distortions. No country can stabilize its currency with such an architecture.

In response to this chaos, the State has repeatedly chosen to pursue currency exchangers, dismantle informal networks, and criminalize operations. However, these measures only address the symptoms, not the causes. Informal networks do not exist without reason; they exist because the State cannot meet the actual demand for foreign currency. For every police operation that is announced, three new networks emerge the next day. This dynamic is inevitable in an environment where the informal market is the only functional way to access foreign currency.

But there is a solution that only requires political will... like almost everything in Cuba:

The solution, therefore, does not lie in replacing the informal market or absorbing it into dysfunctional state structures. The intelligent and modern solution is to acknowledge its existence and legalize it. The informal currency market in Cuba effectively functions as a parallel financial sector that operates with much greater efficiency, speed, and adaptability than the official system. Legalizing it does not mean handing over economic power to underground networks, but rather granting them licenses, allowing them to operate as financial companies, opening bank accounts, declaring transactions, and subjecting themselves to transparent regulations.

The State has enough specialists, pollsters, economists, and statisticians to monitor real transactions and generate reliable data without resorting to police operations. It is not about absorbing the informal market or replacing it with a state version; it is about integrating it as what it already is: the space where the real value of currency is formed in Cuba.

The Cuban government must give up the illusion, which is economically unsustainable, that it can regulate the foreign exchange market.

The real problem is not that the State does not control the informal market; it is that it insists on the fiction that it still could control it. As long as it continues to attack the symptoms: platforms, money changers, networks, operators, instead of addressing the structural causes: lack of reserves, lack of trust, lack of production, lack of monetary discipline, the dollar will keep rising and will continue to escape to the mechanisms where the Cuban economy truly breathes.

The question, then, is not whether the elTOQUE rate is perfect. The question is what real alternative the State offers. And to this day, the answer remains none. In a country without a functional legal market, without a credible rate, without reserves, and without confidence, the informal market will continue to be the only possible reference. Demonizing it will not make it disappear; it will only demonstrate, once again, the State's inability to govern the economy it claims to control.