Buenobanco crisis: Larisa on her savings and BeMedia job suspension

Thank God, I have the chance, as I was saying earlier, to be working through my social media, but there were many years of sacrifice and I’m very sorry about what is happening in, in, in my country, that so many families are knocking on doors to ask for a glass of water,

a plate of food. There are almost three million of us who are practically broke.

And although I have accounts at other banks, obviously, I’m someone who, um— had been working for a long time, but my main—Financiera, but that’s not the case for everyone.

Sure, but my main— sure, but my main, um, investment was there, as one of our colleagues just said, we let ourselves be fooled by the promotions, by the reimbursements, by the opportunities they offered us.

And in my case, I'm also part of the group of companies, because we were working as communications staff with more than three hundred employees at BeMedia, and we have ninety days of, uh, of an extension regarding our jobs,

but the place has already been dismantled, uh, no one informed us, they haven't terminated our employment with the company.

Yesterday, all of us colleagues went to the specialized office looking for answers.

We also have a lawyer in the group who's helping us.

There are so many pregnant women who were part of the group, and colleagues are asking for donations of, of food and supplies too.

Uh, we're all trying to, to support one another and, and for my part, also to show a little more of, of empathy for my colleagues and to support them and also use my social media to share information.

Now, Larisa, you tell us: "I had my savings there," even though you have accounts at other banks and you also worked for a communications company that was part of the holding company and, I mean—Right, I worked at BeMedia. You lost your savings and your job,

aside from your influencer work, which is obviously freelance, but, uh, from one day to the next your life changed a hundred percent. It changed. For everyone. For everyone.

For all Paraguayans, for all the employees.

At the com— at the company where we were, there were three hundred of us.

And yesterday, the cleaner was saying: "They asked me to stay until ten at night to keep cleaning the place."

And, and we already— we worked on Monday, on Tuesday afternoon they informed us that we had a 90-day extension, and we couldn't work, that it was like— That they weren't going to report it.

Was it like a kind of severance or a suspension? The first thing they mention.

Exactly, a suspension, a suspension. So, and look, look, we called, we asked, we checked.

I was, I was also working with a media outlet, which, when they bought the holding company, bought UniCanal and Canal Trece, from which, the moment the two companies became detached, uh, it went back to its original owner,

which is JBB, the owner of Canal Trece and UniCanal.

That's what Daniela Ferreira told us yesterday.

Yes, yesterday. She was lucky to be at Canal Trece when, well, because of the breach, it went back to the previous owner and they were left outside this umbrella of, of, of Buenobanco.

Exactly, exactly. And then everyone who was obviously hired by BeMedia went back to the same um, premises that are BeMedia, and we got back together with the radio, with the streaming, with the, with the YouTube channel,

but nobody gave us an, an answer about what was going to happen later.

In fact, right now, it's fourteen minutes past two here, and five of our group's delegates are in a meeting. Sure.

They're talking with the owner and director of BeMedia, who is Raquel Vázquez. Sure.

Larisa, how are you? Carlos Strione here.

I wanted to ask you— How are you, Carlos? How are you? Good, very good.

That's exactly why, let's say, this woman who's watching us now from Paraguay, there are other people who write to me too.

Uh, how many people used this platform for their day-to-day lives?

Because I'll quote it exactly for you, and write it out, read it to you verbatim, maybe you'll understand it better. Yeah.

Here, even the person who sells you the herbs for tereré charges you. Right. Yeah, yeah.

They charge you through this platform. Street vendors. Newspaper sellers. Newspaper sellers. Newspaper sellers, vehicle attendants, people, just like you were saying, people selling herbs, who had their post, who had all their savings,

people who lived day to day. Especially here, because of the cashback.

The cashback was really generous, the promotions, and obviously, hoping to keep saving more money, to have a better quality of life.

In the case of microentrepreneurs too, since we practically opened your account, You had, I don't know, forty, fifty percent cash back And who wouldn't want forty or fifty percent cash back?

But where did they get the money, Larisa?

Do you understand the question I'm asking? And it's a scam.

And we were all asking ourselves the same thing.

It was the ruse, the trick to lead you to the money.

Right, the thing is, it's, it's the classic scam format.

The scam, of course, is a scam. The thing is, here, with the Central Bank involved.

Right, the state backing it. And the president of the nation backing it, what would you think? That they were little crooks, you know.

And, and with— I'd even say I'm embarrassed by, by Cocitorto, that I don't say it so much.

And the blow, and the biggest blow we suffered, Because basically, Paraguay's National Bank says: “Stay calm, we're being investigated, nothing's going to happen, absolutely nothing.”

More or less, they tell us to stay calm, because obviously everything was fine.

A month later, the bank reports that there are irregularities at the bank, and all the accounts are being closed.

Imagine what it was like on Tuesday, waking up and finding your app doesn't work and you can't see your money, your entire investment, there were people who didn't have…

I want you to listen to what they were saying yesterday they were giving out, uh, ref— uh, I mean, paying back the mon— a little money to all the, uh, people who had less than ten million guaraníes, which is about fifteen hundred dollars and to people with up to ten million guaraníes.

My colleagues were sending messages: “They deposited a hundred dollars in my account.” and, crying, they said: “How will we manage today, and tomorrow?”

It’s sad to see how they’ve robbed us, how they’ve manipulated our money and I hope and, and, and, and I pray to God that it can be resolved and that we can be ourselves again, smiling, at least, because since last— since last Friday we’ve been getting information saying yes, saying no,

telling us to stay calm, to keep going, to, to put in our money, that that’s the investment.

It was a whole drama until Tuesday when we found out that, there was nothing there, that our money was left in…