My comment:

In light of the NA passing the 2nd reading of the new BCV law

whereby the BCV can now directly loan to business and participate in 'productive' ventures......

Teutracker

Bloomberg

April 6 (Bloomberg) -- Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez named Jose Khan the Basic Industries and Mining Minister and acting president of state-run industrial holding company Corp. Venezolana de Guayana amid slumping production and labor unrest.

Khan, who previously served as mining minister under Chavez, has been working as a director at the Venezuelan Central Bank. A decree in today’s Official Gazette announced Khan’s replacement of Rodolfo Sanz, who oversaw the nationalization of the country’s largest steel mill from Ternium SA in 2008.

Chavez is seeking to consolidate his cabinet with close allies ahead of congressional elections in September and amid a labor and electricity crisis that has curbed production at aluminum and steel mills. CVG, as the Puerto Ordaz-based holding company is known, was forced to import generators from General Electric Co. to boost production.

“It’s possible that the labor situation in the company influenced the president’s decision,” Johnny Luna, president of the Sidor steel mill workers union, said in a phone interview. “The workers are protesting for unfulfilled pay promises and the reduced output. Production had been falling even before the electricity crisis.”

Japan’s Showa Denko KK, Kobe Steel Ltd., Sumitomo Chemical Co., Mitsubishi Materials Corp., Mitsubishi Aluminum Co. and Marubeni Corp. own a combined 20 percent of the CVG aluminum company Venalum.

Khan may work on designing a bond backed by future gold production as president of CVG after Sanz told reporters on March 31 that a possible bond issue is under consideration with the central bank.

Central bank President Nelson Merentes has pledged to finance gold production in Bolivar state and to build a gold refinery in order to boost international reserves and develop non-oil export industries. Khan said on March 5 that the bank would buy more than half the estimated 20 metric tons of domestic production this year.

--Editors: Bill Faries, Brendan Walsh

To contact the reporters on this story: Daniel Cancel in Caracas at dcancel@bloomberg.net; Corina Rodriguez Pons in Caracas at crpons@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Dale Crofts at dcrofts@bloomberg.net; Joshua Goodman at jgoodman19@bloomberg.net