Nicaragua

The Pacific coast of Nicaragua was settled as a Spanish colony from Panama in the early 16th century. Independence from Spain was declared in 1821 and the country became an independent republic in 1838. Britain occupied the Caribbean Coast in the first half of the 19th century, but gradually ceded control of the region in subsequent decades. Violent opposition to governmental manipulation and corruption spread to all classes by 1978 and resulted in a short-lived civil war that brought the Marxist Sandinista guerrillas to power in 1979. Nicaraguan aid to leftist rebels in El Salvador caused the US to sponsor anti-Sandinista contra guerrillas through much of the 1980s. Free elections in 1990, 1996, and 2001, saw the Sandinistas defeated, but voting in 2006 announced the return of former Sandinista President Daniel ORTEGA Saavedra. The 2008 municipal elections were characterized by widespread irregularities. Nicaragua's infrastructure and economy - hard hit by the earlier civil war and by Hurricane Mitch in 1998 - are slowly being rebuilt, but democratic institutions face new challenges under the ORTEGA administration.

Economical characteristics

 * Currency: Córdoba (ISO code: NIO)
 * Central bank discount rate: NA%
 * Commercial banks lending rate: 13.17% (31 December 2008)
 * Stock of money (M1): $507.5 million (31 December 2008)
 * Quasi money (with M1 makes M2): $1.81 billion (31 December 2008)

Notable events:

 * Banking crisis: 1987-1996, 2000-2002
 * Hyperinflation: 1985-1990
 * Years in inflation: 12.2% (share of years 1838-2009 with annual inflation above 20 per cent per annum)
 * Public default: 1828-1874, 1894-1895, 1911-1912, 1915-1917, 1932-1937, 1979-2009 (external), 1985-1990 (domestic)

Links

 * Nicaragua on Wikipedia
 * Central bank of Nicaragua
 * Country profile (pdf) from the Enterprise Studies page (part of the The World Bank Group)
 * Studies from the Library of Congress (1986-1998)
 * BBC country profile