68,046 views
Vehicles imported from Western countries were available only for foreign currency for a small group of recipients, i.e. for people who earned part or all of their income in foreign currency while working abroad or for those who received money transfers from abroad from the so-called II payment area (Western Europe and the USA), e.g. from financially supporting family members living outside Poland or people receiving pensions or retirement benefits. The oddity is that after receiving a transfer, it was not possible to withdraw the amount in foreign currency, but only in PeKaO merchandise vouchers issued by Bank Polska Kasa Opieki SA. This substitute means of payment allowed the purchase of goods only in PeKaO or Baltona stores, and abroad it had absolutely no purchasing value! At the end of the fifties, it was possible to reveal the currency you had - previously its possession was punishable - and exchange it in PeKaO for merchandise vouchers. In the 1970s, during the government of Edward Gierek, punishment for trading in commodity bonds, previously prohibited, was discontinued, and only after Leszek Balcerowicz took over as Minister of Finance in September 1989 did currency trading become legal.