Deposed Venezuelan leader Nicolas Maduro publicly claimed he earned the equivalent of $120 a month. However, the findings of investigative journalists and American prosecutors show that his family and those around him made fortunes from corruption and drug trafficking.
The alleged wealth of the deposed leader's family contrasts with the difficult living conditions of citizens of a country that has plunged into a catastrophic economic and humanitarian crisis under Maduro's rule. According to some data, the percentage of people living in poverty exceeds 90 percent, and the minimum wage is 130 bolivars, which is less than a dollar a month.
“I only have one account, a small savings account, where they transfer the president's salary to me,” Maduro said on state television in late December. He assured that his remuneration is the equivalent of “two petros”, a cryptocurrency developed by the Venezuelan authorities that has not been used since 2023.
It is unclear why Maduro provided the amount in the unused cryptocurrency, but media calculations estimate that two petros are approximately US$120.
Addressing citizens in his typical, down-to-earth style, Maduro joked that he practically does not see this money because his wife Cilia Flores manages the finances. “When I reach for them, Cilita has already taken them to buy some things,” he said.
There is no publicly available, official data on Maduro's assets, but statements from the American authorities and media reports paint a very different picture of his finances. American prosecutors described him as “one of the world's largest drug traffickers.”
US Attorney General Pam Bondi reported in the summer of 2025 that the US Ministry of Justice had seized assets related to Maduro worth $700 million. They allegedly included real estate in Florida, a villa in the Dominican Republic, a farm with horses, two private jets, luxury cars, jewelry and millions of dollars in cash.
Around the same time, Latin American media circulated a video in which commentators spotted a Rolex watch on Maduro's hand, with an estimated value of almost PLN 73,000. dollars.
Already in 2020, US prosecutors charged Maduro and a dozen Venezuelan officials with drug smuggling. They claimed he was trying to flood the United States with cocaine to weaken American society while strengthening his own position and increasing his fortune. They also accused Maduro and his entourage of siphoning billions of dollars from the coffers of the Venezuelan state.
Journalistic investigations linked the Maduro-Flores family to cases of widespread corruption, including embezzlement of state funds, and accused them of dealings with foreign businessmen who were subject to US sanctions. There were allegations that the Maduro family took over, among others, actual control over an entire street of luxury homes in Caracas, the New York Times reported.
In 2015, two of Flores' nephews were detained in Haiti by officers of the US drug enforcement agency DEA while trying to smuggle 800 kg of cocaine. They were later sentenced to 18 years in prison, but returned to Venezuela in 2022 as part of a prisoner exchange.
Maduro had been in power in Venezuela since 2013, when he replaced the late Hugo Chavez as president. He ruled with an iron hand, brutally suppressing protests, persecuting the opposition and throwing political opponents into prison. The 2018 and 2024 presidential elections were widely considered rigged in his favor.
At the same time, the country, rich in oil and other raw materials, plunged into hyperinflation and an economic crisis. About 7.7 million people, or roughly one fifth of the population, have left Venezuela in what is being described as the largest migration crisis in South American history.
The minimum wage, unadjusted from 2022, is 130 bolivars, which is approximately half a dollar at the exchange rate from the end of 2025. The government paid public sector employees and retirees allowances equivalent to up to $130 a month, but – as the teachers' union calculated in 2024 – the cost of maintaining a family at a basic level was about $500 a month.
