The new system of exchanging money went into effect Tuesday, and those who didn’t know what the buy and sell rates meant, still didn’t.

The Banco Central has let the colon float within limits, but its one thing to shop around for a good price for a new car. Doing the same thing with pockets bulging with dollars is another.

The Central Bank envisions the savvy economic man, but there was not a lot of difference in the rates offered by the public banks Tuesday. There was a 3.5 to 4 colon difference in the buy and sell rates.

The story was different at smaller, private entities. One reported that it would give customers 470.60 colons for each dollar.  That was well below the average of about 521 colons to the dollar. That was another way of saying they had enough dollars or maybe “Tourists welcome.”

The market showed some movement Tuesday, mostly because of the pent-up demand from a three-day weekend.

The Central Bank will be publishing a daily reference rate that will be the rough average of all transactions at supervised entities.

Some expats think that the market will take a month or two to get evened out. The rates will show seasonal changes as tourists and seasonable businesses make deposits and withdraw funds.

For many, the uncertainty of tomorrow’s rate represents a de facto dollarization of the economy.

The Central Bank expected to get off the hook in supporting the colon. Officials there say that the floating colon will reduce inflation. Others expect the colon to devalue quicker under the new system than it would have had the 20-year-old system of daily mini-devaluations stayed in place.

More than half the debt in Costa Rica is denominated in dollars, as is the exterior national debt. A drop in the value of colons could have serious effects on individual borrowers and the government. which collects its funds in colons.

Perhaps the biggest beneficiaries of the new system are those shady guys who hang around the boulevard and Calle Central with calculators in their hands. They offer tourists and others better rates, and looking for a better rate is being encouraged now.

Of course they offer better rates because many of the dollars they sell say hecho in Colombia in small letters under the engraving of Pablo Escobar.