Can bitcoin help rebuild Venezuela? - Darb Finance

[Darbfinance]

Nowadays, Venezuela is the most striking example of the negative effect of irresponsible political decisions on economy. Back in the 1980s, the country was an oasis of peace and a role model for the region. Its citizens boasted the highest level of earnings on the continent, and high oil prices gave hope for a bright future. Unfortunately, the extreme left came to power soon after. Hugo Chaves put in motion a spiral of social spending, which combined with the decreasing scope of foreign investment and falling oil prices, led to the financial collapse of the country.

The economy has been devastated by raging hyperinflation, estimated to reach the level of millions of percent. Money has completely lost its value – to the point that it is no longer worth to print it. Ad hoc regulations, such as deleting five zeros from banknotes, have failed. The new sovereign bolivar turned out to be as weak as its previous version. Black market traders selling dollars banned under the Maduro regime have been the only ones who benefited from the introduction of the new currency.

Desperate Venezuelans began to look for help for their shrinking savings. They found it in bitcoin – an on-line currency that has proven immune to the dictator's populist declarations. Venezuelans have bought 16 thousand bitcoins in the first quarter of 2019 alone. At the beginning of 2018, the local market leader, i.e. the Finnish trading platform, LocalBitcoins, sold 170 bitcoins a day to customers paying in bolivars. A year later, the number is 10 times higher.
Payments in bitcoin began to be accepted by Mercado Libre, a popular on-line auction site, and Traki, a chain of department stores. The number of places accepting payments in cryptocurrencies kept growing every day. This did not escape the regime's attention. Maduro began to monitor digital currency trading and even recommended the creation of a national cryptocurrency. "Petro" was supposed to be a stable coin, i.e. a currency supported by a raw material. In the case of Venezuela, the raw material in question would be the one which the country has in abundance – crude oil. Each “petro” was supposed to have a value of one barrel of oil, but the plans have never come into fruition. Today, opposition leaders refer to “petro” as a form of “illegal cheating”, and Trump prohibits Americans from trading this cryptocurrency.

Bitcoin invariably remains of interest to Venezuelans, although the anarchy into which their country has plunged is not conducive to the spread of cryptocurrencies. Coinmap – a map showing places that accept bitcoin – indicates that one could pay with bitcoins in just under 200 stores in Caracas. It is not an impressive number for a capital inhabited by 2 million people. However, it can be assumed that many entities prefer to settle in cryptocurrencies without announcing it officially, so as not to attract the attention of public officials.
Venezuela is often presented in the media as a patient zero for implementation of bitcoins on a national scale, but this is somewhat exaggerated. The country experiences frequent electricity shortages, so local mines sometimes do not operate for days. Crypto-entrepreneurs are one thing, but ordinary people often cannot afford a smartphone for account servicing, and the network itself can fail even in city centres. Venezuelan Internet is one of the slowest in the world with an average speed of 1.61 megabits per second.

What is more, Venezuelans often lack financial education which could highlight the advantages of cryptocurrencies as compared to easy-to-manipulate fiat currency. This is where such platforms as Darb Finance can find their niche by offering not only the exchange platform and portfolio, but also educational materials and tutorials which would be useful for independent exploration of the ins and outs of cryptocurrencies. The platform itself is so simple and intuitive that even people less familiar with new technologies can get their heads around it. The stock exchange can operate in two modes: simplified, for beginners and advanced, as a full trading application. Because of that, users can start their adventure with bitcoin practically from scratch and systematically deepen their knowledge through experience. It will certainly take a lot less time than waiting for Venezuela to come out of the crisis.

https://base.darbfinance.com/news/can-bitcoin-help-rebuild-venezuela

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[rez303]

Nowadays, Venezuela is the most striking example of the negative effect of irresponsible political decisions on economy. Back in the 1980s, the country was an oasis of peace and a role model for the region. Its citizens boasted the highest level of earnings on the continent, and high oil prices gave hope for a bright future. Unfortunately, the extreme left came to power soon after. Hugo Chaves put in motion a spiral of social spending, which combined with the decreasing scope of foreign investment and falling oil prices, led to the financial collapse of the country.

The economy has been devastated by raging hyperinflation, estimated to reach the level of millions of percent. Money has completely lost its value – to the point that it is no longer worth to print it. Ad hoc regulations, such as deleting five zeros from banknotes, have failed. The new sovereign bolivar turned out to be as weak as its previous version. Black market traders selling dollars banned under the Maduro regime have been the only ones who benefited from the introduction of the new currency.

Desperate Venezuelans began to look for help for their shrinking savings. They found it in bitcoin – an on-line currency that has proven immune to the dictator's populist declarations. Venezuelans have bought 16 thousand bitcoins in the first quarter of 2019 alone. At the beginning of 2018, the local market leader, i.e. the Finnish trading platform, LocalBitcoins, sold 170 bitcoins a day to customers paying in bolivars. A year later, the number is 10 times higher.
Payments in bitcoin began to be accepted by Mercado Libre, a popular on-line auction site, and Traki, a chain of department stores. The number of places accepting payments in cryptocurrencies kept growing every day. This did not escape the regime's attention. Maduro began to monitor digital currency trading and even recommended the creation of a national cryptocurrency. "Petro" was supposed to be a stable coin, i.e. a currency supported by a raw material. In the case of Venezuela, the raw material in question would be the one which the country has in abundance – crude oil. Each “petro” was supposed to have a value of one barrel of oil, but the plans have never come into fruition. Today, opposition leaders refer to “petro” as a form of “illegal cheating”, and Trump prohibits Americans from trading this cryptocurrency.

Bitcoin invariably remains of interest to Venezuelans, although the anarchy into which their country has plunged is not conducive to the spread of cryptocurrencies. Coinmap – a map showing places that accept bitcoin – indicates that one could pay with bitcoins in just under 200 stores in Caracas. It is not an impressive number for a capital inhabited by 2 million people. However, it can be assumed that many entities prefer to settle in cryptocurrencies without announcing it officially, so as not to attract the attention of public officials.
Venezuela is often presented in the media as a patient zero for implementation of bitcoins on a national scale, but this is somewhat exaggerated. The country experiences frequent electricity shortages, so local mines sometimes do not operate for days. Crypto-entrepreneurs are one thing, but ordinary people often cannot afford a smartphone for account servicing, and the network itself can fail even in city centres. Venezuelan Internet is one of the slowest in the world with an average speed of 1.61 megabits per second.

What is more, Venezuelans often lack financial education which could highlight the advantages of cryptocurrencies as compared to easy-to-manipulate fiat currency. This is where such platforms as Darb Finance can find their niche by offering not only the exchange platform and portfolio, but also educational materials and tutorials which would be useful for independent exploration of the ins and outs of cryptocurrencies. The platform itself is so simple and intuitive that even people less familiar with new technologies can get their heads around it. The stock exchange can operate in two modes: simplified, for beginners and advanced, as a full trading application. Because of that, users can start their adventure with bitcoin practically from scratch and systematically deepen their knowledge through experience. It will certainly take a lot less time than waiting for Venezuela to come out of the crisis.

https://base.darbfinance.com/news/can-bitcoin-help-rebuild-venezuela

I think Bitcoin is only partly helping and it really cannot help Venezuela's economy to be restored. You know, the value of BTC is still being manipulated very strongly and the whales are still the biggest organizers, they still have the right to decide the direction of the market.
so if venezuela people buy many BTC at high prices, the results will still be much worse.
Venezuela should really have a different solution for its currency instead of relying on Bitcoin.

[The Sceptical Chymist]

Um...I'm not sure I trust that source.  Tried loading it, and it's doing something with some application, so I stopped.

I'd been following the blackouts and such in Venezuela for a while, but I kind of lost track of what's going on there.  I did read some articles about how at least some Venezuelans were adopting Dash as a currency, but I read those articles with skepticism to say the least.  I have a strong suspicion that the citizenry is/was using US Dollars as their reserve currency, and I'm fairly certain they have a large supply of those stupid gold dollar coins that the US Mint keeps making and which US citizens rarely use.  But that's smart for them to do, because the USD is still strong.

I never really read anything about the extent to which Venezuelans were using crypto for their daily needs.  I suspect many reports are generated by pro-crypto journalists/writers and that there hasn't been great adoption of any crypto.  But man, I hope I'm wrong.  That would be an excellent thing for both the Venezuelans and bitcoin/crypto in general.

As far as "rebuilding" Venezuela, that's a political thing.  I don't think the history which will be written will attribute much to bitcoin or any other cryptocurrency.  We'll see, though.

[Duzter]

From what I read the cause for the prevailing situation of Venezuela is the poor governance. Cryptocurrency will serve as a supportive tool to the growth of the economy. With the present situation to rebuild the nation a good governance along with support from the world countries is the only possibility. Same time in an article read about cryptocurrency experts giving suggestion to Zimbabwe when it was under hyperinflation to adopt bitcoin which could help them recover the economy. There might be possibilities, but how this gonna get executed is really an unknown fact.

[Kemarit]

For those who haven't had the chance to follow the news in Venezuela, Venezuela accuses U.S., Israel, in alleged coup plot with assassinations and kidnappings. So it looks like there is a failed coup attempt inside Venezuela to overthrow Maduro.

But as far as rebuilding Venezuela, (in case Maduro is ousted), I don't think that crypto will be their go to as other countries hasn't recognized it, but in order to survived the economic turmoil inside Venezuela, whether it's Bitcoin or Dash or any other currency, I think it's a big help to them locally. Rebuilding takes years, and mostly, countries will take out billions of dollars of loan, most probably to World Bank. And I don't think that they wanted to be paid in crypto.

[Febo]

Can bitcoin help rebuild Venezuela?

What Venezuela need is an economy. Not a currency. Well stable currency of course helps but Bitcoin is not really that stable right now. Venezuela problem was that they were to rich for many many decades that they forget how to produce stuff. They were just importing and buying everything. Then suddenly oil is not what it used to be and you add here some economic embargo from rich countries and you get chaos.

[creeps]

Can bitcoin help rebuild Venezuela?

What Venezuela need is an economy. Not a currency. Well stable currency of course helps but Bitcoin is not really that stable right now. Venezuela problem was that they were to rich for many many decades that they forget how to produce stuff. They were just importing and buying everything. Then suddenly oil is not what it used to be and you add here some economic embargo from rich countries and you get chaos.

Exactly, one currency can’t help the economy to fully recover they need a new system and they need to rebuild their own nation. Maybe if the government are too serious and working hard to make their country a better place again maybe in five years time, the inflation will start to go down. Bitcoin is a good currency, but its hard to own bitcoin there if there is so much corruption, and people might get too greedy as well as they want to survive on that chaos.

[1Referee]

I think the aim shouldn't be to wait for the government to do something to improve the situation over there. You can't expect a rotten government that has scammed every citizen of that country and made the far majority of the population become so poor that it's hard to make ends meet. Fuck that government.

People's should aim at building up local economies themselves, and this to some degree is happening already. There have been local initiatives to issue their own paper currency, but this is obviously prone to fraud and not a viable course of action long term speaking. I wish that Bitcoin was further in adoption and fundamental development to onboard these people, but we're still far away unfortunately.

Bitcoin is a fantastic hedge but not a great local currency for daily use. It's too expensive and too volatile even though their own native fiat currency has seen more severe volatility swings, and nearly all to the downside.

[thehun]

Not really. As someone already pointed out, what the country needs is to have an economy again, and in order for this to happen there needs to be a huge paradigm shift. that unfortunately I don't see happening.

Almost every productive citizen had to leave the country after seeing their properties confiscate, their businesses made bankrupt by the corrupt government or the lives of their family in danger. Chavez used oil money to buy votes of poor people for many years and formed a parallel army that has no problem to do all kind of dirty work against protesters. After oil prices went down, these brilliant chaps thought they could just print more money to keep up the pace and something unexpected happened: meteoric inflation, no supplies in the supermarkets, etc. All this while the elites close to Chavez and Maduro are taking out billions of USD to banks in US and diverse tax havens.

Can Bitcoin help people in their everyday lives replacing a currency that has no other use than toilet paper? Yes, definitely. Can it rebuild an economy devastated by a team of crooks who control the army and refuse to make any changes? No, I don't see that happening.

[Slow death]

no offense, bitcoin is something good as an investment, but in the case of the Venezuelans they need 90% of their people to be against tMaduro and oblige him to leave the presidency of the country. while exist fanatics who support mature, he will continue as president and nothing will change in venezuela

People's should aim at building up local economies themselves...

it is very difficult to do business in a country like venezuela, the problem is political persecution and extreme poverty

[timerland]

Will bitcoin single handedly save the Venezuelan economy?

Absolutely not, and I don't know why anyone would expect that given that BTC does not solve their underlying economic issues - an economy overdependent on the price of oil, and an unstable political atmosphere.

But what BTC can do, if more people in Venezuela do choose to adopt it is offer a means for them to transact with foreign entities cheaply, access to the international labor markets, as well as a long term store of value. That way, they are able to outsource their skills without needing to pay a hefty cut to the payment processors in the form of transaction fees and exchange rate spreads, nor do they need access to a bank account to start reaping the benefits of BTC.

[Indrawan77]

I don't think it's possible to save a country using a decentralised currency, in short-term maybe it will seems like a good option, but for long-term it will destroy the economic system, the inflation could swing wildly and it got a chances the country could be manipulated by the whales, for country it need a stable and centralised currency

[nakamura12]

Bitcoin may rebuild venezuela or not at all. First, bitcoin is a decentralized currency which not all people use it as main currency. Second, venezuela had their own centralized currency used so bitcoin can't help rebuild venezuela because of the centralized currency I mentioned but BTC can help fund whatever needed for the economy to grow.

[mamahdedeh]

for now if the price of bitcoin soars, then the country's economy will soon recover, because the people prosper. but without fiat currency, I think it will cause other problems, because the decentralization system cannot be controlled by the government

[stompix]

Again with this?
Bitcoin will save Venezuela, will cure cancer, stop an alien invasion, rewrite the last season of GoT, and get me another coffee cup.....

Bitcoin invariably remains of interest to Venezuelans, although the anarchy into which their country has plunged is not conducive to the spread of cryptocurrencies. Coinmap – a map showing places that accept bitcoin – indicates that one could pay with bitcoins in just under 200 stores in Caraca

Ok, this is a shot of the mempool



No tx under 12sat/byte passed through. You're going to tell me they are spending 0.35$ for each transaction, when the minimum wage :

Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro on Monday raised the minimum wage by 300 percent to 18,000 bolivars per month, around $6.70

They don't even have money for a daily tx fee, not to actually buy something!!!!

The first things they must do
- throw in the sea every incompetent that is appointed right now
- peg their currency to a more stable or a basket of stable currencies (like Bulgaria with the euro)
- stop throwing money around and cut subsidies for gas and electricity as the first is getting smuggled in enormous quantities abroad and the second is not even enough for the country itself.
- stop with the government control fo companies, privatization is the key here
- call in firms from abroad to set up factories, give them tax exempt,  you need to produce something to keep inflation at bay, there are thousands of unemployed, they right now do not produce anything, don't be greedy about some shitty taxes and think of the money they will pay your workers and the produces goods once exported can sustain your trade balance and your currency.

All of this can be done without some crypto, it can be done with fiat, it has proven it works, there is no reason for it not to work in Venezuela.

What it doesn't work is praying to some magic bits that will do the whole thing for you.

[MadeinCoin]

I don't think it's possible to save a country using a decentralised currency, in short-term maybe it will seems like a good option, but for long-term it will destroy the economic system, the inflation could swing wildly and it got a chances the country could be manipulated by the whales, for country it need a stable and centralised currency

But it's useless if the government has no efforts to restore Caracas to normal again. All the people's money will continue to shrink and eventually will cause poverty.
I think it's true that bitcoin can help this country for a while, while waiting for the financial crisis in their country to improve.

[hatshepsut93]

- call in firms from abroad to set up factories, give them tax exempt,  you need to produce something to keep inflation at bay, there are thousands of unemployed, they right now do not produce anything, don't be greedy about some shitty taxes and think of the money they will pay your workers and the produces goods once exported can sustain your trade balance and your currency.

This is why Venezuela became a shithole in the first place, they started nationalizing private business and generally screwing with foreign companies, so they pulled out, which significantly screwed their economy. And now they will have a very hard time getting any foreign investments, unless there will be an actual revolution that will remove socialists from power for good.

Bitcoin invariably remains of interest to Venezuelans, although the anarchy into which their country has plunged is not conducive to the spread of cryptocurrencies.

Venezuela is the opposite of anrchy, all their problems were caused by the state, and the state is still strong there - they have successfully dispersed multiple protests and rebellion attempts in the last few years.

[davis196]

I can't say how bitcoin will help Venezuela,but this country desperately needs a stable currency.
Bitcoin isn't stable,but at least it's way better than the bolivar.
First,the people of Venezuela have to get rid of Maduro and then think about their economic recovery.

[Nellayar]

President Chavez did something wrong in government spending. He thought that releasing fiat currency to all people and printing of it will cause for economic stability. He does not know that it may result a great depression made by inflation.
Right now, I don't know if Venezuela can help using bitcoin. It needs a foreign investment and loan. Something good if they will recover in future. I hope Venezuela's citizen are in good hands right now.

[mu_enrico]

Ok, this is a shot of the mempool

Yep, at the current state of BTC, it would not be that helpful. My tx is still stuck for 6 hours, and only God knows when it will be confirmed.

Honestly, I want them to try Libra and see if it would solve their problem.

[dothebeats]

In times like this, it's hard to assume whether people in Venezuela are actually benefiting from using bitcoin or not. But to give you a general answer on what you're asking, no, bitcoin will not save Venezuela from the massive pitfall it is in right now. The only thing that can help these poor people is a complete government restructure. Ditch everything that's rotten, replace them with new and hope for the best. Sure, it will not be an easy feat, but it's a permanent solution, not a band-aid one like bitcoin offers to citizen's who can use bitcoins for their transactions on everyday life.

[aad140386]

I do not think that Bitcoin will be able to somehow influence the economic situation in Venezuela. This country needs fundamental structural reforms. It is not enough to have money, they still need to be able to use it. And it seems to me that just the leadership of Venezuela does not know how to govern the state. This country has the largest proven oil reserves in the world, but look at how people live in Venezuela and how people live in Saudi Arabia. The problem is not that there is little money, but that they are not able to direct them correctly.

[magneto]

Rebuilding Venezuela will be ultimately dependent on what the Maduro administration chooses to do, essentially.

Even with all of the benefits that Venezuelans can get from adopting bitcoin, such as the fact that they are able to now have access to a liquid, low cost, long term store of value, as well as being able to be banked, away from the chaotic banking system that they've got with tons of limitations in terms of controls of how much money you can take out, if there aren't structural reforms within the economy, it'll still continue to sink down.

It's deeply saddening to see Venezuela in this state. BTC is able to help Venezuelan individuals for sure, but when it comes to things like their trade balance, spending deficit, and rampant inflation, there is nothing it can do.

[BitHodler]

In times like this, it's hard to assume whether people in Venezuela are actually benefiting from using bitcoin or not.

It's not really that hard to be honest. The lowest class of citizens do not use Bitcoin because they either don't know what it is, or they don't have a computer or smartphone to access the internet.

Even if these people know about Bitcoin and have a smartphone to access the internet with, the cost of using Bitcoin is another major problem. People there barely have any money to spend on food, let alone pay $2 fees per transaction.

Venezuelans who do benefit from Bitcoin in lesser form are the middle class, but mainly the elite there because they are known with the economical situation and have a decent understanding of what a convenient hedge is.

[pugman]

The first things they must do
- throw in the sea every incompetent that is appointed right now
- peg their currency to a more stable or a basket of stable currencies (like Bulgaria with the euro)
- stop throwing money around and cut subsidies for gas and electricity as the first is getting smuggled in enormous quantities abroad and the second is not even enough for the country itself.
- stop with the government control fo companies, privatization is the key here
- call in firms from abroad to set up factories, give them tax exempt,  you need to produce something to keep inflation at bay, there are thousands of unemployed, they right now do not produce anything, don't be greedy about some shitty taxes and think of the money they will pay your workers and the produces goods once exported can sustain your trade balance and your currency.

All of this can be done without some crypto, it can be done with fiat, it has proven it works, there is no reason for it not to work in Venezuela.

What it doesn't work is praying to some magic bits that will do the whole thing for you.

Solid points, but Venezuala doesn't have a lot of fiat, they need fiat. They need to start trading oil with other countries, make imports and exports a little more convenient than what its normally defined as fuck all.

They should definitely stop backing their resources with the petro crypto, and rather focus on increasing the employment rate and reduce the inflation over there.

Bitcoin is not going to help here whatsoever, bitcoin was never meant to bring up unstable economies, it never was and it never will. They need to reform all their policies, get loans from the world bank, and spend a lot of money on helping business and individuals grow, because if that doesn't happen, the economy will collapse at any given time.

Honestly, I want them to try Libra and see if it would solve their problem.

You would be a maniac to think that a currency wherein which hardly anyone knows about will be able to upbring an economy that has been doomed for years now.

[mu_enrico]

You would be a maniac to think that a currency wherein which hardly anyone knows about will be able to upbring an economy that has been doomed for years now.

LoL

Anyway, the Venezuelan need to trade, and at the moment they don't have a solid MoE. They could use another currency like USD or EUR as a replacement for Bolivar, but I think the government wouldn't allow this. This idea is only a solution to the MoE for trading purpose, while they have multi-dimensional problems that are not only related to the economy but also politics and governance.

[FanEagle]

I think not just bitcoin but crypto could play a role in there. I mean think about it if you have a national crypto like petro that is based on a resource you have in abundance then you can actually make a big difference in your countries problems. Why would a country have inflation?

Well, they usually have too much worthless money and nobody really needs that national currency for anything at all that is why, the moment your countries money becomes so useless that even your own nation doesn't use it it becomes worthless. However if you have a crypto pegged to a national resource you have a lot of like petro that will be needed and used because people will want your oil (or whatever it is) and they will have to buy your petro to actually buy your petrol which will make your currency valuable and wanted again.

[ityandsyn]

     It can really help since their money have zero value already and USD was banned  which is not useable at all so they prefer to use bitcoin , indeed they are buying 16 thousands  BTC to circulate Venezuela and establishments and Mall are accepting it for payment .

[marcbitcoins]

So i see that Venezuela is really in crisis now. Bitcoin could help to rebuild the nation but it should start first from their leaders specially their President Maduro in which the people don't trust his administration anymore. Bitcoin is a good tool to rebuild the nation but without a good and strong lider to handle it then any tools and help will be totally useless.

[Dondont]

surely it can be as long as the country's government does not repeat the mistakes that have been made and its people also want to help improve the economy in me most likely the country will quickly experience good and fast-moving changes too

Usually countries that have economic experience that have touched the worst point can be quite strong later because they have felt the worst direct effects that can occur if they happen again. However, just relying on Bitcoin / Crypto I don't think it will be helpful enough

[NathanJB]

No, the problem in Venezuela is not as shallow as can be cured by a simple change of currency. As a matter of fact, the Bolivar, Venezuela's currency, has been used side by side with Petro, a cryptocurrency designed to replace Bolivar. It ended up not sufficient to address a much worse problem, the lightning fast inflation. However, inflation is only an offshoot problem of another problem. The problem in Venezuela is complicated enough, involving socio-political issues, economic, and so on.

[kaya11]

The problem is it is on the middle of other super powers countries agenda, schemes and territorial conflicts. It can be one step close to someones borders, I feel sorry for the Venezuela people, they in the middle of someone else' war, economical and maybe territorial. If only the super powered countries leave it alone then someday or somehow, it can be helped. Bitcoin is flexible and can be utilize by any other form of government, if they do so then they will be the first to become richer than any other countries if Bitcoin goes mainstream or it could also lead them to it's opposite effect if it goes down. At this point they are somehow in a tight spot.

[davinchi]

<snip>

If they had taken the step of seeking the refuge in cryptocurrency long before now that they are been hit with terrible hyperinflation, I am sure there would have been some level of control, but the damage has been done already, and it will take time for cryptocurrency bitcoin to really salvage their situation).

You see, the problem most countries do have has always been with their leaders, when this issue happened to Venezuela, rather than the government to quickly embrace bitcoin and see how they can sharply manage the economy situation with it, they were still wasting time trying to create their own cryptocurrency called PETRO which could not see the light of the day as they got lots of critics about it.

[palle11]

I can't say how bitcoin will help Venezuela,but this country desperately needs a stable currency.

I think it is possible for that to happen. Venezuela need huge fiance to help there economy and if for example they invested like 10btc at $4000 last four months, selling at this point for $11,000 would have been $7,000 profit on one btc multiple by 10, that would have been $70,000 profit at least. So , I think btc can help any country going down if they invested at the right time.

[el kaka22]

I think this is more about governments attachment to the currency than anything else. Its not just in Venezuela but in everyone around the world. Lets see why it says bitcoin is liked by the Venezuelan people, it clearly states its because people know its out of maduros reach and it can be bought and sold without having to worry about maduro killing it too because bitcoin can't be ruled over by one entity or can be destroyed by wrong governmental approach.

Now tell me wherever you live, don't you feel like your government whoever that is and which ideology they belong to has too much control of your countries economy? Don't you think your prime minister or king or whatever at the top is can affect your currency way too much? Well bitcoin can stop that globally and not just in third world countries but in places like USA where country seems leader in many things whereas the leader is a moron.

[stompix]

~

Solid points, but Venezuala doesn't have a lot of fiat, they need fiat. They need to start trading oil with other countries, make imports and exports a little more convenient than what its normally defined as fuck all.

They should definitely stop backing their resources with the petro crypto, and rather focus on increasing the employment rate and reduce the inflation over there.

Their main problem is that in order to sell that oil, they need money to help them keep the extraction capacity at least stable, not even talking about expanding. So, they need money...to make money! And they don't have money!
The situation is pretty fucked up, like having a privatekey with 100 bitcoin but not affording the cheapest computer or phone to let you get it into a wallet and spend it. 

As for that petro crypto, I consider it a joke.
How the hell can you back crypto with a thing you extract and sell? We should all create our own cryptos and back them up with the food we have in the fridge or the food we've eaten yesterday. Or the gas in our cars that might not be there tomorrow.

Anyhow, that country is lost, and if they manage to get someday some real leaders in charge that have a clue about economics probably oil at that time would have lost 90% of its importance.

[cramcram21]

If I am not mistaken there was a thread made by someone who used to lived in Venezuela and earn in crypto currency,
The person stated that it couldn't really fixed Venezuela and you could read that in here :
https://www.coindesk.com/bitcoin-cant-fix-venezuela-i-should-know

[pugman]

Their main problem is that in order to sell that oil, they need money to help them keep the extraction capacity at least stable, not even talking about expanding. So, they need money...to make money! And they don't have money!
The situation is pretty fucked up, like having a privatekey with 100 bitcoin but not affording the cheapest computer or phone to let you get it into a wallet and spend it. 

As for that petro crypto, I consider it a joke.
How the hell can you back crypto with a thing you extract and sell? We should all create our own cryptos and back them up with the food we have in the fridge or the food we've eaten yesterday. Or the gas in our cars that might not be there tomorrow.

Anyhow, that country is lost, and if they manage to get someday some real leaders in charge that have a clue about economics probably oil at that time would have lost 90% of its importance.

Venezuela won't go anywhere, not until they still have oil beneath their lands. All the rich power hungry nations will keep trying their best to get their hands on those bad boys.

As for backing petro with oil, its not such a bad decision, like its kinda a smart move, but only for the wrong country,if that makes sense. You see, Venezuela is fucked up in so many ways, even petrol/oil isn't going to be enough to help them out of this shithole of a mess that is their economy. While petrol is a good resource that is backing up what is arguably one of the worst crypto-currencies, if petro ever gets screwed, and they dont money to extract the oil and sell it, then there is no use of having it as a backup in the first place. What Venezuela needs is a huge loan from the World Bank and do a massive revamp of their economy, make all kinds of socio-economic reforms, and not make any more stupid mistakes.

[Indamuck]

Venezuela has been systematically been destroyed from outside nations.  Don't believe what you hear in the media about socialism failing and this being a result of only their own government.  Countries are thirsty for their natural resources as as seen in the middle east before America will do anything to get it.

[stompix]

Venezuela has been systematically been destroyed from outside nations.  Don't believe what you hear in the media about socialism failing and this being a result of only their own government.  Countries are thirsty for their natural resources as as seen in the middle east before America will do anything to get it.

Yeah yeah., the CIA,  the Illuminati, the Rothschilds, the Bilderberg...we know
Not the taxi driver made president, not the socialist leader whose daughter has billions in banks, the others are to blame.

Every time socialism fails is because of the others, or because that wasn't real socialism!
Do you know what country didn't go the way of real socialism?   Denmark /s

America is willing to spend billions and trillions to get millions and billions in resources...
Before even starting the whole debate about how the US is stealing oil from the middle east how about you look who is exploring what in Irak and you'll be surprised seeing China and Russia taking a bigger chunk of the oil fields there.

And speaking of Russia...
How Russia sank billions of dollars into Venezuelan quicksand

The us has enough oil to don't give a damn about Venezuela, there is cheaper oil in Canada  billions waiting for a pipe, this whole propaganda of the evil west trying to rob poor socialist nations is just a show to hide the fact that they are morons who would go broke even if they would shit and fart money

What Venezuela needs is a huge loan from the World Bank and do a massive revamp of their economy, make all kinds of socio-economic reforms, and not make any more stupid mistakes.

Which is not going to happen.
Most people that wanted a change have fled the country, the majority that is left is trapped in a situation where reform means them losing their invented and useless jobs, and those guys have behind the votes of their family who depend on the government checks. This is why Maduro is still in power and is still going to be for a long time...
Too many people depend on them and they are afraid that if things change they will lose their jobs, privileges and so on.

Anyhow, none of the things that need to be made/achieved can be done with Bitcoin alone, unlike some suggest.
Bottom line, Bitcoin is not a magic pill or a magic trick.

[beerlover]

Why do we really hope bitcoin to save the country that is really at the bottom of the sea, why not use bitcoin as a prevention instead of construction from zero? I mean if you ask me bitcoin should not be something that should save an already destroyed country like Venezuela but it should be something to use so you do not become like Venezuela.

What do you think will happen to all countries in the world? You think the economy will not get worse and worse? Look at how our financial system is leveraged, it is totally unsustainable and we will keep getting those 2008 type of crisis over and over again until the system is actually stopped and changed to something else. A country that is purely bitcoin based would be safe from all of this and would never become like Venezuela at all.

[indrakusumaindra]

Why do we really hope bitcoin to save the country that is really at the bottom of the sea, why not use bitcoin as a prevention instead of construction from zero? I mean if you ask me bitcoin should not be something that should save an already destroyed country like Venezuela but it should be something to use so you do not become like Venezuela.

What do you think will happen to all countries in the world? You think the economy will not get worse and worse? Look at how our financial system is leveraged, it is totally unsustainable and we will keep getting those 2008 type of crisis over and over again until the system is actually stopped and changed to something else. A country that is purely bitcoin based would be safe from all of this and would never become like Venezuela at all.

well we still not sure about the value of bitcoin and if you think using bitcoin to make a stable value i do think its absurd. Lets think about why boulevard are loosing value on the first place. I think the economy in venezuela is full of fraud and it makes the value of the money down and also they can even control the inflation. Venezuela bankrupt cause they only have one big resources income which is oil and when oil price drop they are rekt and its impact to the value of the boulevard.

[Harlot]

Nope. I have seen an article where the inflation in Venezuela is so extreme that even other currencies and other commodities such as the U.S. dollar and gold are still affected by the inflation. Venezuela have started accepting other fiat currencies in their country hoping that it won't be affected by inflation but still it failed. Reuters reported that its not due to the Bolivar's devaluation but because the goods in the country are becoming more scarcer and scarcer. You can read the full article here.

[Sirait]

in my opinion, the cryptocurrency like Bitcoin is very capable of rebuilding Venezuela, the Venezuelan government took advantage of the profits obtained from Bitcoin to buy gold as their country's foreign exchange reserves so that the Venezuelan economy rose again. I really hope the economic and political conditions in Venezuela improve.

[YOSHIE]

Venezuela, one country that is currently hit by the worst economy that has so far been afflicting,
This American neighbor has become a public concern that is very concerned by all countries.
For Bitcoin itself to boost the Venezuelan economy, it is very thin if it is adjusted to the country's currency, because bitcoin is currently traded with the currency of each country, for one bitcoin it needs one sack of Venezuelan money, so in my opinion it is very difficult to groweconomy of Venezuela.

[mersal]

Not only in Venezuela it is going to to protect people from the inflation all over the world and it is going to happen in the near future like less than 10 years. Many productions says that people will convert into digital currency payment and it is going to be decentralized the chances of Bitcoin is going to rule the world in the future is high.

[justdimin]

I think the best part about bitcoin and Venezuela is that it can be an example to whole world. If Venezuela somehow gets out of this mess they are in thanks to crypto currency then other countries with the same problem but not as big may start to use it as well.

I mean not just bitcoin but they are building their own currency as well, oil is priced in dollar everywhere around the world, if they decide to sell it via Petro the crypto currency they print then they can just sell it to whoever they want and not sell it with their own national currency and make Petro more loved by other countries (forced to love to buy oil) and that is how they can come out of this mess. If other countries with problems on their currency used this tactic after that and go out then whole world may do the same.

[hatshepsut93]

Bitcoin's economy is insignificant on a large scale of things - people like comparing Bitcoin's marketcap with marketcaps of various companies, but it doesn't tell us anything about Bitcoin's ecosystem, and this ecosystem is actually tiny, because so few people use it as a currency, most of Bitcoin's economy is just exchanges, gambling and darknet markets. So, connecting a wrecked country to Bitcoin's economy won't solve any problems.

[Lightsource]

Bitcoin can help a lot of the citizen maintain the price of their savings. But what Venezuela needs is good leadership. Believe it or not Chavez wasn't that bad. He had his vision, his plans, and so knew how to execute it. Maduro, he doesn't have his own vision, but more than that he's incompetent and corrupted.

[Schirer]

It could but the main problem is the political situation.
If the political situation in this country remains the same, uncertainty , corruption , greed dominates over peoples voice , then no crypto will help this system.

[bettercrypto]

    It can really help since their money have zero value already and USD was banned  which is not useable at all so they prefer to use bitcoin , indeed they are buying 16 thousands  BTC to circulate Venezuela and establishments and Mall are accepting it for payment .

i don`t know if your opinion will hundred percent works. In fact, I have doubt with it because Venezuela is a country not a province. In some point, bitcoin might become their tool in order to stop the inflation. But I think that is not enough. They really need to borrow a money from other countries or so called, foreign loan. In that case, they can easily stand again their economy.

[Carreuh]

Venezuela is now a country that has a very devastated economy due to massive inflation, but if the government wants to improve the economy of that country with bitcoin this might be possible even if it is not very effective because bitcoin has a big risk but also has great results.  the government is really focused and confident about bitcoin so this will help their declining economy a little

[pokeronlinestatus]

My question is how is the Bitcoin going to be of help to the Venezuelans? Is it of help to those who are poor or only to those who are rich in that country? Cause I’m very sure that all those poor people in that country cannot be able to afford buying a Bitcoin… even an average person there might find it very difficult to buy Bitcoin. So my question is how is Bitcoin going to be of benefit to them? I don’t even see a way that would be possible… Except for those of them that are rich, it would be a method for them to earn more money and add to their wealth.

[MTL4]

Anytime you have a country where the confidence in government has collapsed (Venezuela, Zimbabwe, Weimar Germany, Argentina, etc) it will also collapse the economy using that currency even if there may be significant resources in the country which might otherwise have it flourish.  When money changes hands, it is the speed at which it changes hands that implies a healthy economy and vice versa.  When the currency collapses the speed of exchange drops to catastrophic levels doing serious damage to the economy. On top of this the government killed the free market (by trying to price fix everything, never works because business just flees the country). In order to counteract this, people in that country will adopt outside currencies not only to preserve wealth but also to maintain some ability to do business.  Bitcoin falls squarely in this category as something that is easy to transport and holds its value well (although it's very volatile to use as money).  Maduro has created some sort of centralized oil pegged crypto (which will likely fail miserably since the government could just as easily cancel the peg at any time, not to mention it's centralized so the gov't controls it).  Venezuela will improve in the future (bitcoin will be a small part of it) but not until free markets return.

[Indamuck]

Not sure if any of you are familiar with an online video game called Runescape but Venezuelans have flocked to that game in mass in order to farm video game gold and sell it for real money.  They make much more farming gold, up to 10x the amount than they would make working a regular job in their economy.

[Pab]

Bitcoin can't help that case . Only people can do that
Venezuela is owned by military junta .It is always very hard to overcome any regime
Regime will always like to keep wealth for them self
Venezuela is rich country because of oil but people are poor because of regime
It is the same like in a case of Africa Nations countries
 

[serjent05]

Bitcoin can be a tool yes, but I think the people who are governing the country have the responsibility and capability to rebuild Venezuela.  Remember it is not Bitcoin that runs the government, it is their elected officials that runs and implement programs that can develop the country. 

[Renampun]

I think Bitcoin can't help rebuild Venezuela, the most vital problem facing Venezuela is politics in their country. it will be very difficult to improve the economy in Venezuela if the political temperature in their country is hot.. homework for heads of state and government in Venezuela is to improve the political temperature in their country, then after that Bitcoin might help a little to rebuild the economy of their country.

[jonaire99]

Restore peace and order first before building Venezuela. Bitcoin might help rebuild the country if the government legalized it to become a legal tender in their transactions. Bitcoin can only help people or their citizens in their financial need on a limited basis. The whole nation will still depend on an effective leadership that can bail out Venezuela from its present misery.

[Sithara007]

Does anyone knows anything about Petro, the cryptocurrency that was created by the Maduro regime? I wanted to check the market cap and trade volumes, but there is no entry for this coin at the coinmarketcap website. There is a listing for PetroDollar (XPD), but I guess that one is a different altcoin. I am surprised because there was news that Petro is being actively used to evade sanctions.

[guoyu78]

Not sure if any of you are familiar with an online video game called Runescape but Venezuelans have flocked to that game in mass in order to farm video game gold and sell it for real money.  They make much more farming gold, up to 10x the amount than they would make working a regular job in their economy.

This is the only way that I see Venezuela benefiting from cryptocurrency, at least it will help them add more money to their GDP if they use cryptocurrency to develop applications that people can makes use of, and use it to gather wealth from other countries. If I were them, I would also explore that area of gambling, because this session is really raking in so much money for countries where this gambling with cryptocurrency is situated.

Although even if they use cryptocurrency to generate money, they still have to put a lots of structures in place, I think their government too needs to work on their internal system that has been so corrupted which is one of the thing that led to their economy going down, so many areas needs to be tackled first before using crypto to generate money.

[stompix]

Not sure if any of you are familiar with an online video game called Runescape but Venezuelans have flocked to that game in mass in order to farm video game gold and sell it for real money.  They make much more farming gold, up to 10x the amount than they would make working a regular job in their economy.

If there is any opportunity to get easy money, then quite a large number of people show themselves in these actions.  Who wants to work physically, If there is an opportunity to come up with something easier.

That's not easy money!
They stay glue to CRT monitor in unventilated rooms, doing the same task for hours after hours, getting up for only a few minutes until the day ends when their eyes can't hold anymore.

Yeah, earning money while playing sounds so nice but when you don't play for fun and when you start farming it's getting so damn annoying is worse than a regular job. I remember when I was playing Diablo 2 and I had to farm the bosses for keys to open the portal, it was so annoying to do the same thing over and over and over it took all the fun from the game.

Does anyone knows anything about Petro, the cryptocurrency that was created by the Maduro regime? I wanted to check the market cap and trade volumes, but there is no entry for this coin at the coinmarketcap website. There is a listing for PetroDollar (XPD), but I guess that one is a different altcoin. I am surprised because there was news that Petro is being actively used to evade sanctions.

And you believed that crap?
You really thought somebody will buy those coins and use it to trade with a bankrupt regime?
Venezuela can ask to be paid in anything they want, the problem is that the market is full of oil and there is low quality so they are actually the ones looking for buyers. And when this happens is the buyer that puts the conditions.

Besides, sanctions are not working this way, avoiding sanctions is not smuggling oil.
Sanctions target the opposite party, you can buy with drugs, gold, coins yuans, it doesn't matter once you deal somebody on that list you're also in trouble and you will face the consequences.


Maduro is simply trying to force citizens to buy that crap as it's a clever way to print money with affecting the bolivar (for a while)

[Leyss]

No, Venezuela needs the restoration of the country's real economy and a change of money, even for cryptocurrency, will not solve anything. I read that President Maduro took out the country's gold and currency reserves with the help of Russia, and without him it would be very difficult to restore the economy.
As for the use of bitcoin by the population of Venezuela, then in social networks the most criticism of bitcoin comes from the citizens of Venezuela. Due to hyperinflation for the citizens of Venezuela, Bitcoin’s fees are too high and this causes their discontent.

[Argoo]

No, Venezuela needs the restoration of the country's real economy and a change of money, even for cryptocurrency, will not solve anything. I read that President Maduro took out the country's gold and currency reserves with the help of Russia, and without him it would be very difficult to restore the economy.
As for the use of bitcoin by the population of Venezuela, then in social networks the most criticism of bitcoin comes from the citizens of Venezuela. Due to hyperinflation for the citizens of Venezuela, Bitcoin’s fees are too high and this causes their discontent.

Yes, it's true. In order for Bitcoin to help restore the economy of Venezuela, for this you first need to eliminate the general crisis in this country, and above all the political one. There he is already so sharp that no one, even the best means of payment, will save this country. In my opinion, President Maduro does not cope with the situation there, he relies on force, many people are dying. It's horrible.

[South Park]

Not sure if any of you are familiar with an online video game called Runescape but Venezuelans have flocked to that game in mass in order to farm video game gold and sell it for real money.  They make much more farming gold, up to 10x the amount than they would make working a regular job in their economy.

If there is any opportunity to get easy money, then quite a large number of people show themselves in these actions.  Who wants to work physically, If there is an opportunity to come up with something easier.

To me that is not an example of people trying to get easy money, that is an example of people choosing an unorthodox way of making money since their economy is completely destroyed by the economic decisions of their leaders, I have always found incredible how politicians can destroy countries that are so rich and with so many natural resources, how they could crash the economy when they have the largest reserves of oil in the world? An effective politician could even find a way to run a small government just based on the oil profits and tourism.

[BitHodler]

I have always found incredible how politicians can destroy countries that are so rich and with so many natural resources, how they could crash the economy when they have the largest reserves of oil in the world? An effective politician could even find a way to run a small government just based on the oil profits and tourism.

Corruption. If the highest positioned politicians are in it, which they are in countries such as Venezuela, it happens almost as if it is natural. You either choose to participate or pay a hefty price for not participating.

The government there is one of the highest paying employers by far, so what is the alternative? Not many are brave enough to go against Maduro even if they don't agree with his way of "leading" the country.

In the western world you have so much more wealth and freedom available that it's hard to imagine someone would do that, but in these countries it's just the way it is. People are and will remain stuck in a shitty situation.

[fiulpro]

I think there comes two factors when we talk about Bitcoins helping Venezuela.

1. Government cannot control it
     Government can control the money supply , the banking system , they can shut down the major institutions, they can even ban the usage of Bitcoins but you can always make a personal wallet and trade person to person.

2.It doesn't depend on the economy
     Even if the economy goes down the fact that Bitcoins is based on investments makes it a major advantage for the people of Venezuela, they actually could easily be able to gain profit even if the market in Venezuela is not at a good state.

[Wolfwar]

Venezuela has a practical leading position on the ownership of deposits of oil reserves of our planet.  I think that my proposal is the answer to how Venezuelan citizens can solve all their problems.  The only problem of Venezuela is a vile, corrupt and deceitful government.  Their country is very rich, but it does not work for the good of its citizens.

[angel55]

Not sure if any of you are familiar with an online video game called Runescape but Venezuelans have flocked to that game in mass in order to farm video game gold and sell it for real money.  They make much more farming gold, up to 10x the amount than they would make working a regular job in their economy.

If there is any opportunity to get easy money, then quite a large number of people show themselves in these actions.  Who wants to work physically, If there is an opportunity to come up with something easier.

To me that is not an example of people trying to get easy money, that is an example of people choosing an unorthodox way of making money since their economy is completely destroyed by the economic decisions of their leaders, I have always found incredible how politicians can destroy countries that are so rich and with so many natural resources, how they could crash the economy when they have the largest reserves of oil in the world? An effective politician could even find a way to run a small government just based on the oil profits and tourism.

I think it is still better than hard physical labor out in the sun all day.  Grindy video games are very popular even though you just repeat the same task over and over.  If there was no onw to buy those vritual items in the first place they wouldn't be farming them.

[bitgolden]

Venezuela has a practical leading position on the ownership of deposits of oil reserves of our planet.  I think that my proposal is the answer to how Venezuelan citizens can solve all their problems.  The only problem of Venezuela is a vile, corrupt and deceitful government.  Their country is very rich, but it does not work for the good of its citizens.

Then I don’t think that they will ever have any solution to their problem, because when it comes to country with very high corruption rate, virtually 80 percent of their leaders are involved in corruption, so who is going to fight who? The only thing that suites all those corrupt countries, is either what happened to Ghana during the time of Jerry rollins, who killed all the corrupt leader happens in that country too, or better still, the creator of the universe comes to wipe those corrupt leader off the face of the earth.

So, long as those corrupt officials are still, in government, economy will always be bad, and the cryptocurrency that would have also help built for their economy will be used wrongly, because the only thing they will use it for it to launder and hide money with it.

[FrozenBit]

Will a country's economy depend on Bitcoin? Does this really happen?
In my opinion, no. Bitcoin is known as a deflation tool that makes money more and more valuable.
But one thing people need to keep in mind is that the whales are controlling the value of Bitcoin and can make it disappear at any time.
This is a great challenge for Venezuelans in investing in Bitcoin.
I think, they should only invest in real estate or gold. It will be safer for them.

[Wolfwar]

Why exactly cryptocurrency is needed to help Venezuela?  As far as I have information, this country has rather large reserves of oil.  I think that Black Gold would give every opportunity to improve people's lives.  It seems to me that first of all you need to talk not about the cryptocurrency for Venezuela, but about the change of power.

[daarul50]

I think for now bitcoin can be used as a temporary solution to overcome the economic crisis in the country. But, if bitcoin is used as the main solution then I think it will become an additional problem in the future because bitcoin is not a currency that can be used as a currency for a country.

[JohnBitCo]

I think for now bitcoin can be used as a temporary solution to overcome the economic crisis in the country. But, if bitcoin is used as the main solution then I think it will become an additional problem in the future because bitcoin is not a currency that can be used as a currency for a country.

If the Venezuela government  do not want to be dependent on the US  Dollar,  they can use of bitcoin in the country as a main currency.  If the Bitcoin is implemented  in a country it will really help in recovering from the economic crisis of the country.

[Jane2019]

Now they need peace as 1st thing, without it all financial reforms, aid and so on is just burning money. Bitcoin, or maybe rather non printing memory, is a great idea but it needs time and stable situation...

[iMark]

I think for now bitcoin can be used as a temporary solution to overcome the economic crisis in the country. But, if bitcoin is used as the main solution then I think it will become an additional problem in the future because bitcoin is not a currency that can be used as a currency for a country.

If the Venezuela government  do not want to be dependent on the US  Dollar,  they can use of bitcoin in the country as a main currency.  If the Bitcoin is implemented  in a country it will really help in recovering from the economic crisis of the country.

Its funny, first Venezuela does not depend on the dollar, and secondly how can you explain that when Venezuela uses bitcoin as a main currency then improves the country's economy?
the country's economy is bad because of many weak human resources, bad government, unsupportive geography, weak exports, and many other things. do you think bitcoin can help that?

[joelsamuya]

Bitcoin is certainly helping many Venezuelans mitigate the burden of the economic malady that descended the country ever since it was under the regime of the famous Hugo and even into the current administration of Maduro. The people suffered a lot and many of them left the country for good and many more are planning to escape the country to seek for greener pasture somewhere else.

The thing is that although Bitcoin can be of help, the solutions to the country's problems should start with the people. The people should decide that enough is enough and it is time for real change...real change that can come only when a new regime that represented the real aspirations of the people and their visions can come into power.

This is easier to say than do, I accept. Under a regime of a dictator, change of power is not that easy as elections can easily be rigged in favor of those in power. Still, am hopeful that the time is coming when real change can occur. Good luck and more to the people of Venezuela!

[SirLancelot]

Its funny, first Venezuela does not depend on the dollar, and secondly how can you explain that when Venezuela uses bitcoin as a main currency then improves the country's economy?
the country's economy is bad because of many weak human resources, bad government, unsupportive geography, weak exports, and many other things. do you think bitcoin can help that?

That is what they need to understand that cryptocurrency is just to help the payment system of the country while the blockchain technology entire could assist different part of their organization to run smoothly, but that is when the system has not been damaged as much as it is right now.

The thing that can help Venezuela is for them to adjust on those things that are listed there, most especially their government, and I think this issue should be as a result of bad government that they have, I learnt that the current president got there as a result of coup, so how do we expect things like this not to happen, when the leadership of the country is probably in the hand of someone who does not know anything much about how to run government.

[fenixosup]

Only right goverment there can really help to rebulid it. BTC may help but only a bit

[AjithBtc]

Venezuela failed in implementing the possible ways of bitcoin into the management in a perfect way. If this was executed in the stepped manner now the Venezuela economy could have got recovered to some level compared to the present situation that is prevailing within the country.

[Bitcoin Seller]

I don’t think Bitcoin itself can help Venezuela recover. However, if you create a favorable investment area in the country, with a ready-made business, and attract external investment capital into the country, it will definitely help.

It helps people already. To "deceive" American sanctions, Bitcoin is used already in the airports. People start to convert everything that they get into BTC as the hyperinflation is visible - the residents of the countries carry money in huge bags as even paper cost more than this money itself! Venezuela tries to create its own crypto, but I guess people will trust Bitcoin only.

[whyrqa-1]

I don’t think Bitcoin itself can help Venezuela recover. However, if you create a favorable investment area in the country, with a ready-made business, and attract external investment capital into the country, it will definitely help.

I am sure that investors will not invest in the economy of a country in which there are huge problems with the courts, law enforcement system and corruption.  As history shows, first you need to put things in order in the country, and then attract investment.

[Ranly123]

surely it can be as long as the country's government does not repeat the mistakes that have been made and its people also want to help improve the economy in me most likely the country will quickly experience good and fast-moving changes too

Do you think their kind of governance will change? Yes, Bitcoin can rebuild Venezuela's economic growth but with those corrupt politicians that will hinder it's progress, I think nothing can be changed.

[Saint-loup]

Bitcoin can't rebuild an entire economy of a country becauseit is a limited currency but it can help people to meet their needs. At present, Venezuela need to have a strong mandate from the people to start rebuilding its economy that is in crisis. The nation need to resolve first the leadership of the country if the present leader is ineffective in solving the crisis in that country.

Well according to Trustnodes and the datas from Localbitcoins, Venzuela is handling about $7 million of bitcoins in peer to peer exchanges per week, and 600units in Bitcoin.

They’re handling about BTC600 a week, but due to bitcoin’s rising price and due to continued hyperinflation in Venezuela, the fiat equivalent of bitcoin volumes look parabolic.

Part of the reason for this growing bitcoin popularity in Venezuela, which has spread to their neighbors like Colombia, is because of US sanctions.

https://www.trustnodes.com/2019/08/06/bitcoin-fiat-volumes-in-venezuela-all-time-high-on-us-sanctions

And according to cryptoglobe, last month the peer to peer exchanges on LocalBitcoins, reached its highest trading volume ever in the country "coinciding with a drastic hyperinflation of the national currency".

https://www.cryptoglobe.com/latest/2019/08/localbitcoins-trading-volumes-hit-new-high-in-venezuela-as-inflation-keeps-rising/

[Muffinmanlet]

Only thing that can help Venezuela is to discard their socialism and begin anew with a model based more on capitalism, a small state, and personal freedom.

[rima valen]

Venezuela is one of the most oil-rich countries. But right now Venezuela is experiencing a very severe crisis. The reason is the drop in oil prices. As much as 95 percent of Venezuela's income from exports. This means that when oil prices are high, a lot of money flows into the Venezuelan government's income. But when oil prices plummeted in 2014, all important government programs had to be stopped. Plus hundreds of thousands of Venezuelans leave their country. Venezuela is increasingly short of quality residents and the future is bleak. I am very sorry for a country that used to be very safe but now it is devastated and if I think bitcoin can only help a part of the Venezuelan economy but it can't help 100% you know the bitcoin movement like how

[guoyu78]

--snip

This is the first time that I am seeing analysis about their practical interest in cryptocurrency and If they are really making use of bitcoin as you said, I think it would at least assist a little bit in helping them balance their economy, but I don’t see it completely rebuilding it for them.

There is need for their government to do beyond cryptocurrency alone and then look into other system they can join to the use of cryptocurrency to help them and that is the only way that any of their activities in cryptocurrency would really have any effect over there economy. This figure you really quoted is really a big amount of money to be trading per week, and if bitcoin can really solve part of their challenges, I am sure that they would be number one country that will always support cryptocurrency.

[TheCoinGrabber]

I saw the comments on the first page so I didn't open the link. Knowing what's happening there, ANYTHING can be of help though I'm not sure how long they can keep using bitcoins. Transactions isn't exactly fast and I can imagine that their electricity situation has gotten only worse.

A way to exchange value underground would help them survive but not exactly thrive unless their government changes.

[Chrystora123]

Based on the news, I see there are 6 causes of Venezuela bankrupt
- Declining oil exports
- In debt
- Incorrect Economic Policy
- Inflation Increases sharply
- Business and Industry
- Corruption
this is a classic problem, and I'm very sure if Bitcoin and cryptocurrency are able to rebuild Venezuela

Bitcoin can't rebuild an entire economy of a country becauseit is a limited currency but it can help people to meet their needs. At present, Venezuela need to have a strong mandate from the people to start rebuilding its economy that is in crisis. The nation need to resolve first the leadership of the country if the present leader is ineffective in solving the crisis in that country.

Venezuelan leaders must make a major overhaul, especially their country's political system.. if they want to open the way for cryptocurrencies. I am very sure that 5 out of 6 problems causing their country to collapse can be resolved.

[yvesp110]

I saw the comments on the first page so I didn't open the link. Knowing what's happening there, ANYTHING can be of help though I'm not sure how long they can keep using bitcoins. Transactions isn't exactly fast and I can imagine that their electricity situation has gotten only worse.

A way to exchange value underground would help them survive but not exactly thrive unless their government changes.

Bitcoin is just another form of money. You know it is the digital money that helps you make transaction more quickly and even multiply your value if you speculate in Bitcoin. The situation in Venezuela is not of financial kind but of political nature. The political scenario is pretty ill and this is the main reason of the weak financial condition of Venezuela.

[TheCoinGrabber]

I saw the comments on the first page so I didn't open the link. Knowing what's happening there, ANYTHING can be of help though I'm not sure how long they can keep using bitcoins. Transactions isn't exactly fast and I can imagine that their electricity situation has gotten only worse.

A way to exchange value underground would help them survive but not exactly thrive unless their government changes.

Bitcoin is just another form of money. You know it is the digital money that helps you make transaction more quickly and even multiply your value if you speculate in Bitcoin. The situation in Venezuela is not of financial kind but of political nature. The political scenario is pretty ill and this is the main reason of the weak financial condition of Venezuela.

Sadly true. They used to refine their own oil but their infrastructure has stagnated, heck even become obsolete, that now they only sell crude oil.

It would be interesting though if the government don't crack down on bitcoin (unlikely). Since their currency is now worthless and the dollar some use can be easily confiscated, we could see an economy develop that mostly use bitcoin.

[JohnBitCo]

I don’t think Bitcoin itself can help Venezuela recover. However, if you create a favorable investment area in the country, with a ready-made business, and attract external investment capital into the country, it will definitely help.

I am sure that investors will not invest in the economy of a country in which there are huge problems with the courts, law enforcement system and corruption.  As history shows, first you need to put things in order in the country, and then attract investment.

Investors needs a good economy situation and peace in the country and only then they will invest in any country. Venezuela is surely not a right place for the investors to invest  now. Implementing and making bitcoin legal only will have no effect unless you make the overall financial and economic condition better in the country.

[Questat]

It's the government's responsibility to rebuild it's country, bitcoin is just an option for people to save their money from hyper inflation.
Rebuilding a nation would result to creating jobs sustainable for people to live in a certain country, and bitcoin does not create job it only facilitate the online transaction, in short it's just a tool and it's up to the users on how to effectively manage that too.

[hulla]

Bitcoin will help the Venezuelan in terms of wants and needs but it will definitely not rebuild Venezuela because such responsible belong to the government and the major causes of the Venezuela problem is their government ego act of not seeking advice , not opening doors concrete inter businesses, electricity and relying on crude oil.

[Vektrum]

I don’t think that Bitcoin can help Venezuela, but I’m sure that Bitcoin is already helping people who live in this country. Thanks to Bitcoin, many residents of this country were able to avoid financial losses associated with the devaluation of the country's national currency, which makes Bitcoin valuable.

[bitsurfer2014]

Certainly Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies will be a key factor in rebuilding Venezuela but we must emphasize the need for their Government to initiate drastic reforms, good governance and formulate new socio-economic policies to help alleviate its situation right now. Being a top oil producer in the world and an OPEC member, it has a rich oil resources that can make the life of every Venezuelan more comfortable and its somewhat ironic why they are in a crisis right now?

[samcrypto]

Bitcoin will help the Venezuelan in terms of wants and needs but it will definitely not rebuild Venezuela because such responsible belong to the government and the major causes of the Venezuela problem is their government ego act of not seeking advice , not opening doors concrete inter businesses, electricity and relying on crude oil.

Their government is the worst problem here, they are corrupt and didn’t do anything good to stop that hyper inflation. Bitcoin gives opportunity to everyone who are open to adopt and to use it, it will be hard for Venezuela to do that if other countries are preventing it, we should support them on that.

[7788bitcoin]

Certainly Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies will be a key factor in rebuilding Venezuela but we must emphasize the need for their Government to initiate drastic reforms, good governance and formulate new socio-economic policies to help alleviate its situation right now.

It is a hard task to reform Venezuela from this slum, it is the biggest crises the world has seen and it is mainly due to bad governance and corruption and if you continue those bad policies for a while even if you are oil rich you will reap what you sow, bitcoin can help the citizens up to a certain point in trade and commerce and they could convert their wealth and store in bitcoin than their local currency.

Being a top oil producer in the world and an OPEC member, it has a rich oil resources that can make the life of every Venezuelan more comfortable and its somewhat ironic why they are in a crisis right now?

If there is bad policies and corruption for years and their income starting going down because of the oil price going down and the expenditure still continue to rise without any actions then you will end up like Venezuela.

[serjent05]

Certainly Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies will be a key factor in rebuilding Venezuela but we must emphasize the need for their Government to initiate drastic reforms, good governance and formulate new socio-economic policies to help alleviate its situation right now. Being a top oil producer in the world and an OPEC member, it has a rich oil resources that can make the life of every Venezuelan more comfortable and its somewhat ironic why they are in a crisis right now?

I disagree, Bitcoin and cryptocurrency are just tools.  The one who will rebuild Venezuela is the government since they are the one who have the capability to do so.  Bitcoin and other cryptocurrency may help an individual but without the governments push, it will just help few and these are those who help themselves to know about cryptocurrency.

[Averim]

In this kind of situations bitcoin is not inaff, sure it can help a lot but in this situation it's a question of political stability.

[shoreno]

Bitcoin and other cryptocurrency may help an individual but without the governments push, it will just help few and these are those who help themselves to know about cryptocurrency.

not even a few because if cryptos are banned no one can use it but cryptos arent the only curreny or payment method that are available for use if ever local mediums arent available . 

there are many alternatives out there wether its online or offline   .  people can help thier selves if they want to or if will they unite all together to fight thier issues  . not all problems can be shoulder to the government  . 

[dat.ho12492]

Certainly Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies will be a key factor in rebuilding Venezuela but we must emphasize the need for their Government to initiate drastic reforms, good governance and formulate new socio-economic policies to help alleviate its situation right now. Being a top oil producer in the world and an OPEC member, it has a rich oil resources that can make the life of every Venezuelan more comfortable and its somewhat ironic why they are in a crisis right now?

I disagree, Bitcoin and cryptocurrency are just tools.  The one who will rebuild Venezuela is the government since they are the one who have the capability to do so.  Bitcoin and other cryptocurrency may help an individual but without the governments push, it will just help few and these are those who help themselves to know about cryptocurrency.

Accurately, rebuilding an empire, rebuilding a society and establishing common rules, that is the government, they are people who have the capacity to make such changes and works, Bitcoin cannot replace the government to do such jobs because it has no will and it is not created for that purpose, bitcoin only works according to the needs of buying and selling, and individuals who take advantage of these needs will have an increase in income. Venezuela needs a wise government, bitcoin is not necessary

[lixer]

Bitcoin is just another form of money. You know it is the digital money that helps you make transaction more quickly and even multiply your value if you speculate in Bitcoin. The situation in Venezuela is not of financial kind but of political nature. The political scenario is pretty ill and this is the main reason of the weak financial condition of Venezuela.

Sadly true. They used to refine their own oil but their infrastructure has stagnated, heck even become obsolete, that now they only sell crude oil.

It would be interesting though if the government don't crack down on bitcoin (unlikely). Since their currency is now worthless and the dollar some use can be easily confiscated, we could see an economy develop that mostly use bitcoin.

With the condition of Venezuela, I think it is worst more than what bitcoin can solve for them, and as the other mate said, their problem is not financial crisis but political crisis, so they have to tackle that first before they can think of using bitcoin to boost their economy, even if they apply bitcoin today, maybe it will help some individuals, but can never help the country has a whole to resolve anything.

I believe they need to start from their government first by changing their leaders because I put the blame on their leaders who could not control the situation until it got out of hand, which mean most of them are just bunch of hands that are not capable of handling whatever positions that they have there.

[TheCoinGrabber]

snip

snip

Sadly true. They used to refine their own oil but their infrastructure has stagnated, heck even become obsolete, that now they only sell crude oil.

It would be interesting though if the government don't crack down on bitcoin (unlikely). Since their currency is now worthless and the dollar some use can be easily confiscated, we could see an economy develop that mostly use bitcoin.

a good government system will bring goodness to the natural potential in Venezuela. the government spoiled its people to live well without developing the potential of human resources, but maybe this is the government's strategy to get sympathy to be elected, but after the price of oil plummeted, they began to experience difficulties, because there were no other leading commodities

They relied on one resource, nationalized everything and basically gave away money. Now all that money is useless. Compare this with the monarchies in Middle East that despite the royals taking in a large portion of the income the country still manages to maintain a good standard of living.

There's little indication that the government would change, hence all the talks of people just using alternative currencies. Bitcoin would be harder to confiscate than dollars so despite fluctuations and limitations on transaction speed, it's still a good alternative. The only reason it could fail is if the blackouts get out of hand.

[bitcoinposts]

Bitcoin and crypto currency have very huge impact on Venezuela financial situation their most widely used currency is Dash and Moreno and BTC all these are being used for transactions for day to day life and these currencies got very huge demand

[legendster]

Can it save? yes.

But it depends on how it is implemented. Petro is certainly not going to have much of an impact.

But the funny thing is, it is only the failing economies like Venezuela or Iran that are kind of embracing crypto so that it can save them, but leaving out the whole decentralized part out basically resulting in flat unimpressive results.

On the other hand, the countries that are fully getting on board the crypto wagon are basically all developing countries or tech-rich countries from Asia. None of the major developed countries have fully embraced crypto and that's what is the need of the hour. Whether it will happen? who knows.

Think of India for a second. If India bans crypto completely, it would lose out of $12billion worth of money from its economy. It has already lost the $2 billion from the whole Kashmir reorganization campaign. So the total loss could pan out to be around $15 billion.
This is the same country where people live in unlivable areas. 300 million people in poverty. Power cuts, lack of drinking water, floods & natural calamities, hostile terrorists etc etc - can a country like this really afford to not adopt crypto? No. But it might happen anyway because of politics.

So the answer to your long question is basically 'politics' - if implemented right, then yes it will not only save Venezuela but it'd set it up for a prosperous future, but sadly that will not happen under Maduro.

[bryant.coleman]

They relied on one resource, nationalized everything and basically gave away money. Now all that money is useless. Compare this with the monarchies in Middle East that despite the royals taking in a large portion of the income the country still manages to maintain a good standard of living.

There's little indication that the government would change, hence all the talks of people just using alternative currencies. Bitcoin would be harder to confiscate than dollars so despite fluctuations and limitations on transaction speed, it's still a good alternative. The only reason it could fail is if the blackouts get out of hand.

Venezuela was a poor country to start with, unlike the Gulf nations such as the United Arab Emirates and Qatar. When Hugo Chavez first came to power in 1999, he put a lot of effort to alleviate poverty using the petrodollars. And it was successful to some extent. During his terms (1999-2013), the poverty rate in Venezuela declined from 49% to 33%. More importantly, free healthcare was made available to all the citizens by partnering with Cuba.

Things changed when Nicolás Maduro became the president in 2013. Corruption, which was suppressed by Chavez suddenly became unmanageable. On top of that, the crude oil prices crashed one month later, and the government bagan facing a funds crunch. The crude oil production also decreased due to ongoing disputed and this resulted in less Forex revenues. With less foreign currency, the regime could no longer maintain a stable exchange rate for the national currency, and this ultimately resulted in inflation spiralling out of control.

[Paulinerims]

Its a better solution than their current situation but you can't expect bitcoin to just save a country. The price is still being manipulated and while hyperinflation in venezuela is getting out of hand and people need to convert their fiat into something else, its not a long term solution to just get in bitcoin and thats it. Alot of thigs need to change for them ..

[Naida_BR]

Bitcoin is a great tool for Venezuela if they want to start rebuilding their country.
The citizens have access to a digital currency that it is a lot of stronger than Bolivar. and apart from that, once they buy it they are not going to lose it in value. The difficult point for them is that Bitcoin is expensive for them and they cannot buy it.

[dengpei]

Bitcoin is not some kind of magic wand that one can wave over a dilapidated country ad miracles happen... no, I think Venezuela needs to get its politics right as well as effectively dealing with social ills like corruption and government bureaucracy.

[TheCoinGrabber]

They relied on one resource, nationalized everything and basically gave away money. Now all that money is useless. Compare this with the monarchies in Middle East that despite the royals taking in a large portion of the income the country still manages to maintain a good standard of living.

There's little indication that the government would change, hence all the talks of people just using alternative currencies. Bitcoin would be harder to confiscate than dollars so despite fluctuations and limitations on transaction speed, it's still a good alternative. The only reason it could fail is if the blackouts get out of hand.

Venezuela was a poor country to start with, unlike the Gulf nations such as the United Arab Emirates and Qatar. When Hugo Chavez first came to power in 1999, he put a lot of effort to alleviate poverty using the petrodollars. And it was successful to some extent. During his terms (1999-2013), the poverty rate in Venezuela declined from 49% to 33%. More importantly, free healthcare was made available to all the citizens by partnering with Cuba.

Things changed when Nicolás Maduro became the president in 2013. Corruption, which was suppressed by Chavez suddenly became unmanageable. On top of that, the crude oil prices crashed one month later, and the government bagan facing a funds crunch. The crude oil production also decreased due to ongoing disputed and this resulted in less Forex revenues. With less foreign currency, the regime could no longer maintain a stable exchange rate for the national currency, and this ultimately resulted in inflation spiralling out of control.

I've seen photos of Dubai before the oil boom, it was a backwater fishing village. Much of the Arabian peninsula was a backwater. I think the main difference is that the Arabs hired competent (in their case, foreign) experts. The Venezuelans nationalized many things. And it got out of hand that the government would just expropriate businesses and property. No one would want to do business under such environment. The situation in Venezuala we are seeing now was inevitable, high oil production and prices can only delay it for so long.

[bryant.coleman]

I've seen photos of Dubai before the oil boom, it was a backwater fishing village. Much of the Arabian peninsula was a backwater. I think the main difference is that the Arabs hired competent (in their case, foreign) experts. The Venezuelans nationalized many things. And it got out of hand that the government would just expropriate businesses and property. No one would want to do business under such environment. The situation in Venezuala we are seeing now was inevitable, high oil production and prices can only delay it for so long.

The oil boom happened in Dubai and Abu Dhabi long back, during the 1970s. Until then, the economy of the UAE was very much dependent on the export of dates and pearls. The effects from the oil boom was not visible before early 1990s. With Venezuela, the oil boom started only during the late 1990s, when new technology made extraction of extra-heavy crude profitable.

In the case of UAE, the oil price crash came after the economy was fully stabilized. But Venezuela was yet to properly develop its economy, when that happened. So UAE was better prepared, while Venezuela fared poorly. But then, there were other factors that exacerbated their suffering. The first and foremost thing that can be said is corruption.

[SirLancelot]

I was thinking about this and totally forgot this topic, since I was talking about it to my friends who didn't cared about it, I may as well write here. If bitcoin can be used properly like a national currency you are basically leveraging yourself against the world and that would usually involve a lot of risks because you are a whole nation instead of a person and dropping from 20k to 3k would have killed an economy if it was nation wide but considering nations like Venezuela is not doing good at all there is really no point not taking that risk.

If price goes up you are using bitcoin that is higher in value than dollar but if it goes down you are already a screwed up country anyway how worse can it get. That is why I feel like maybe Venezuela could use bitcoin (not petro, not eth, just btc) as their national currency and can get away with it.

[JohnBitCo]

I don’t think that Bitcoin can help Venezuela, but I’m sure that Bitcoin is already helping people who live in this country. Thanks to Bitcoin, many residents of this country were able to avoid financial losses associated with the devaluation of the country's national currency, which makes Bitcoin valuable.

At one side you are saying that Bitcoin cannot help  Venezuela and at the same time you are saying that bitcoin is already helping Venezuela. The two statements does not match.
Governments need to develop the system to provide jobs and other facilities to the people and alone bitcoin cannot help to rebuild the country. Its the plan and the execution of it by the government which may make the country stand on its foot.

[suzanne5223]

I don’t think that Bitcoin can help Venezuela, but I’m sure that Bitcoin is already helping people who live in this country. Thanks to Bitcoin, many residents of this country were able to avoid financial losses associated with the devaluation of the country's national currency, which makes Bitcoin valuable.

At one side you are saying that Bitcoin cannot help  Venezuela and at the same time you are saying that bitcoin is already helping Venezuela. The two statements does not match.
Governments need to develop the system to provide jobs and other facilities to the people and alone bitcoin cannot help to rebuild the country. Its the plan and the execution of it by the government which may make the country stand on its foot.

You're right with what you said but the above user also makes every good point because the problem of Venezuela start with bad governments and if the problem is not fixed or well manage it might somehow affect the success story of cryptocurrencies user, investors and minings which reside there.

[JohnBitCo]

I don’t think that Bitcoin can help Venezuela, but I’m sure that Bitcoin is already helping people who live in this country. Thanks to Bitcoin, many residents of this country were able to avoid financial losses associated with the devaluation of the country's national currency, which makes Bitcoin valuable.

At one side you are saying that Bitcoin cannot help  Venezuela and at the same time you are saying that bitcoin is already helping Venezuela. The two statements does not match.
Governments need to develop the system to provide jobs and other facilities to the people and alone bitcoin cannot help to rebuild the country. Its the plan and the execution of it by the government which may make the country stand on its foot.

You're right with what you said but the above user also makes every good point because the problem of Venezuela start with bad governments and if the problem is not fixed or well manage it might somehow affect the success story of cryptocurrencies user, investors and minings which reside there.

Yes, most people thinks crypto can change the economic conditions of a country, This is a misconception and Venezuela is one example of this. You need a democratic government also and dictatorship will never make economic conditions better. You can read more about it here https://www.coindesk.com/bitcoin-cant-fix-venezuela-i-should-know and know why the crypto adoption failed to recover the economy.

[senin]

Venezuela, first of all, needs sound management of the state economy. Without this, no Venezuelan cryptocurrency will save. If the economy is not effective and the funds are thoughtlessly used at the discretion of President Maduro, the country will steadily become poorer. Cryptocurrency can save some time against inflation, however, if this situation has dragged on for years, cryptocurrency will not help here.

[styca]

No, it can't help Venezuela. Not yet.

I think the potential is there for crypto to help crisis-hit countries in the future, but we are still a long way away from that point. Bitcoin in particular, you're not going to go to the shop, pick up a bottle of milk, then stand at the till for hours waiting for the transaction to clear... and then when it finally does, Bitcoin has crashed 5% so the purchase is rejected anyway. No, USD is still the go-to standard in these situations.

But in the future, sure, there's a decent chance that fast, reliable crypto - one that doesn't suffer from price volatility - could be used as a safe haven.

I do think it's coming, but we are nowhere near that point yet.

[STT]

The solution in that case is the shop runs a tab which is cleared every month or every week by 1 transaction in Bitcoin at the rate for that moment.   If the shop cannot give that ability to hold the bill then its not going to work.   Its common practice in a restaurant to eat a 3 course meal and wine and only pay at the end, I dont see why we cant improvise a solution where bills are cleared collectively.
   If everything has to be cleared with zero time given and no trust available, FIAT will fail in many countries and I think only precious metal coins then work as various networks in infrastructure and finance fail.    I'm a pretty big bear but I dont think we go to that point.   Even if people prefer the gold as payment idea, its still going to be used to clear a bill done weekly or monthly and credit cards based on gold payment like that are available and similarly in Bitcoin I think this is possible.

[SirLancelot]

Venezuela, first of all, needs sound management of the state economy. Without this, no Venezuelan cryptocurrency will save. If the economy is not effective and the funds are thoughtlessly used at the discretion of President Maduro, the country will steadily become poorer. Cryptocurrency can save some time against inflation, however, if this situation has dragged on for years, cryptocurrency will not help here.

Besides developing economic management, I think Venezuela must also form a healthy government, many officials think about themselves. By using cryptocurrency, I think it will improve the economy, if many people invest in crypto and the price of bitcoin soars

If many of them invest in cryptocurrency, it would only help the already existing holders to get their money out of the market quickly while they get locked in for another period of time, till they get other high investors to out in money.

I don’t even know exactly what is going on about Venezuela and its crisis anymore because it has really been long that I read news about them, and I do hope that they have sort dot whatever issue that they have that is making them have all those problem, if they have not solved it, then the only solution to their problem would just be for them to change their leader first before they can even think off using cryptocurrency to stabilize their economy. At this their level, I don’t see cryptocurrency helping out.

[Dr.Osh]

according to the news that I read, a bitcoin-based ATM was installed in Venezuela on September 10 yesterday. this proves that Venezuela is one place that is suitable for the development of bitcoin. This will facilitate the use of bitcoin, bitcoin cash, and dash on Venezuela. for more information about this, you can read in https://cointelegraph.com/news/after-multiple-false-starts-venezuela-may-have-its-first-bitcoin-atm

[tungaqhd]

according to the news that I read, a bitcoin-based ATM was installed in Venezuela on September 10 yesterday. this proves that Venezuela is one place that is suitable for the development of bitcoin. This will facilitate the use of bitcoin, bitcoin cash, and dash on Venezuela. for more information about this, you can read in https://cointelegraph.com/news/after-multiple-false-starts-venezuela-may-have-its-first-bitcoin-atm

To be honest with you, the information you read always appears a lot every day, apply crypto and bitcoin ATMs, launch bitcoin's ATMs somewhere but these stories really don't have a lot of convincing evidence, mostly appear for a short time and then people will forget it, these bitcoin ATMs are still operating until now or it has stopped working, it is a question without an answer. Therefore, do not rush to think that Venezuela is a suitable country to develop bitcoin, and bitcoin doesn't rebuild a country, it just builds assets for people who know how to use it

[Naida_BR]

according to the news that I read, a bitcoin-based ATM was installed in Venezuela on September 10 yesterday. this proves that Venezuela is one place that is suitable for the development of bitcoin. This will facilitate the use of bitcoin, bitcoin cash, and dash on Venezuela. for more information about this, you can read in https://cointelegraph.com/news/after-multiple-false-starts-venezuela-may-have-its-first-bitcoin-atm

How is Venezuela suitable for developing the ecosystem?
Venezuelans do not have a lot of mine to buy amounts of bitcoin... They search for food in garbage bins.
If you want to develop the ecosystem you should bring a developed country to bitcoin embrace. Otherwise, nothing is going to happen and the condition will be stagnant.

[Dr.Osh]

To be honest with you, the information you read always appears a lot every day, apply crypto and bitcoin ATMs, launch bitcoin's ATMs somewhere but these stories really don't have a lot of convincing evidence, mostly appear for a short time and then people will forget it, these bitcoin ATMs are still operating until now or it has stopped working, it is a question without an answer. Therefore, do not rush to think that Venezuela is a suitable country to develop bitcoin, and bitcoin doesn't rebuild a country, it just builds assets for people who know how to use it

I agree with your opinion, but when a country installs a bitcoin atm, I think that the country supports its people to use bitcoin. because of that, I think it's appropriate to start developing Venezuelan thinking about cryptocurrency-based businesses, especially bitcoin.

this is just an estimate that I have in mind, but with that in mind, I am sure Venezuela can use bitcoin to their advantage whether it is individuals or groups, and that can make Venezuela a step ahead. although there are people who think that it is a small thing, but the change also starts in small things.

[andriarto]

according to the news that I read, a bitcoin-based ATM was installed in Venezuela on September 10 yesterday. this proves that Venezuela is one place that is suitable for the development of bitcoin. This will facilitate the use of bitcoin, bitcoin cash, and dash on Venezuela. for more information about this, you can read in https://cointelegraph.com/news/after-multiple-false-starts-venezuela-may-have-its-first-bitcoin-atm

To be honest with you, the information you read always appears a lot every day, apply crypto and bitcoin ATMs, launch bitcoin's ATMs somewhere but these stories really don't have a lot of convincing evidence, mostly appear for a short time and then people will forget it, these bitcoin ATMs are still operating until now or it has stopped working, it is a question without an answer. Therefore, do not rush to think that Venezuela is a suitable country to develop bitcoin, and bitcoin doesn't rebuild a country, it just builds assets for people who know how to use it

Venezuela countrie use bitcoin because it is in a difficult position after their currencies have hyper inflation, I think Venezuela should improve the government system first, so that there is no severe corruption. with a healthy government I think it will be easier to improve the country's economy

[Jating]

according to the news that I read, a bitcoin-based ATM was installed in Venezuela on September 10 yesterday. this proves that Venezuela is one place that is suitable for the development of bitcoin. This will facilitate the use of bitcoin, bitcoin cash, and dash on Venezuela. for more information about this, you can read in https://cointelegraph.com/news/after-multiple-false-starts-venezuela-may-have-its-first-bitcoin-atm

To be honest with you, the information you read always appears a lot every day, apply crypto and bitcoin ATMs, launch bitcoin's ATMs somewhere but these stories really don't have a lot of convincing evidence, mostly appear for a short time and then people will forget it, these bitcoin ATMs are still operating until now or it has stopped working, it is a question without an answer. Therefore, do not rush to think that Venezuela is a suitable country to develop bitcoin, and bitcoin doesn't rebuild a country, it just builds assets for people who know how to use it

Venezuela countrie use bitcoin because it is in a difficult position after their currencies have hyper inflation, I think Venezuela should improve the government system first, so that there is no severe corruption. with a healthy government I think it will be easier to improve the country's economy

Removed Maduro in power and then we will take if bitcoin can help rebuilding their economy.

Today, we are seeing the bitcoin is really helping them survived. I read reports that it needed like $15 billion to rehab the country, so how can bitcoin support that? There need to be some economic stimulus at some point and help from other countries like US.

Bitcoin can still be used as a tool, but to say that it is the miracle that Venezuelans are prying to help them recover, I'm not sure about that.

[STT]

Bitcoin might be of some help mitigating the worst effects, I've heard of people who long ago realized holding the plain cash was a losing game and switched to Bitcoin as dollar and many currencies are not available to them.     So to a limited extent its helped but it cannot revive the economy.
  To really help Venezuela get back it would be something simple as oil prices going back over 100.   I dont really believe in this as a solution exactly but there is no doubt it would help raise revenue and justify much more extraction of their heavy sour oil.   Obviously they need reform and to rebuild and that is unlikely with a military led government suppressing any natural activity, I believe the military are now involved in facilitating drug trafficking to fund themselves and are unwilling to allow any transition away from the control which allows that.

[muhhentuhhen]

To be honest with you, the information you read always appears a lot every day, apply crypto and bitcoin ATMs, launch bitcoin's ATMs somewhere but these stories really don't have a lot of convincing evidence, mostly appear for a short time and then people will forget it, these bitcoin ATMs are still operating until now or it has stopped working, it is a question without an answer. Therefore, do not rush to think that Venezuela is a suitable country to develop bitcoin, and bitcoin doesn't rebuild a country, it just builds assets for people who know how to use it

I agree with your opinion, but when a country installs a bitcoin atm, I think that the country supports its people to use bitcoin. because of that, I think it's appropriate to start developing Venezuelan thinking about cryptocurrency-based businesses, especially bitcoin.

this is just an estimate that I have in mind, but with that in mind, I am sure Venezuela can use bitcoin to their advantage whether it is individuals or groups, and that can make Venezuela a step ahead. although there are people who think that it is a small thing, but the change also starts in small things.

Gosh, even Venezuela now will have Bitcoin ATM.  They need it for sure. Last month, LocalBitcoins cryptocurrency exchange reached the highest volume of trade in the country in its history, and the inflation of the national currency reached crazy numbers - 10,000,000%. The rate of hyperinflation in Venezuela his really insane - no one country has such a catastrophy in the economics. Bitcoin can save people.

[stompix]

according to the news that I read, a bitcoin-based ATM was installed in Venezuela on September 10 yesterday. this proves that Venezuela is one place that is suitable for the development of bitcoin.

Yeah, right!

I was curious to see where this ATMs is located and not to my surprise,

the ATM is 500 meters from the border, probably they will have time to pack it up and cross into Columbia till the police arrive if a raid will target it. 
Sorry to burst your bubble but at this moment Venezuela is not a suitable ground for anything and I'm pretty sure even in this case, this ATM is being used more by smugglers than want to avoid border control rather than normal people

I agree with your opinion, but when a country installs a bitcoin atm, I think that the country supports its people to use bitcoin. because of that, I think it's appropriate to start developing Venezuelan thinking about cryptocurrency-based businesses, especially bitcoin.

Start realizing the difference between a company and a country, BMW doing something is not Germany doing the same, McDonald's is not representative for the US and neither is a panda for China. Furthermore, the company that installed that ATM is located and based in Colombia!
Again, sorry for another bubble! 

[jamesndungu1]

I have heard of the country’s economy basically collapsing, and the residents are making an effort to turn to cryptocurrency. Majority of the businesses in the country are accepting bitcoin as a means of payment which can make me conclude that yes, Venezuela is using Bitcoin to revive its economy. I think that this is generally a step towards economic success for Venezuela once the government fully embraces the technology.

[SquallLeonhart]

Bitcoin might be of some help mitigating the worst effects, I've heard of people who long ago realized holding the plain cash was a losing game and switched to Bitcoin as dollar and many currencies are not available to them.     So to a limited extent its helped but it cannot revive the economy.
  To really help Venezuela get back it would be something simple as oil prices going back over 100.   I dont really believe in this as a solution exactly but there is no doubt it would help raise revenue and justify much more extraction of their heavy sour oil.   Obviously they need reform and to rebuild and that is unlikely with a military led government suppressing any natural activity, I believe the military are now involved in facilitating drug trafficking to fund themselves and are unwilling to allow any transition away from the control which allows that.

I am not sure that the US even wants them to get solution, it is actually glaring that cryptocurrency would have a very big role to play in the life of a country positively, and maybe if Venezuela had adopted it ad succeed in even switching to their petro coin, probably they would have been free from the bondage of dollar and then their economy would be strengthened, but I heard that the president of America is planning to ban the Pedro coin, and the only reason they would do that is selfishness, because I guess they are using it to strengthen their own coin, and they don’t care if another country’s economy is collapsing or not.

If Venezuela can really succeeded in limiting their use of cash and then switching over to crypto, I am sure their economy would be a very great one.

[Police Indo]

at the near future, BTC for venezula can be a solution, but for a long time I think there must be a change from their own country. because BTC requires adequate internet access and account services. what if the government doesn't support it? economic change cannot be comprehensive

[ichai]

actually the problem of deflation is caused by people thinking that bitcoin does not make it.
As you can see, Litecoin has had a Halving event recently but its value has dropped significantly since that day, it's different from the previous halving.
Therefore, the market is only deciding the price of bitcoin, not deflation here!
If one day sharks didn't like bitcoin because it was too slow, they would discard it and the value would be zero. and you know what happens to bitcoin holders

[bryant.coleman]

The embargoes and sanctions are causing hardship in Venezuela. Unless these are removed, the economy won't recover. And I don't know how Bitcoin can become useful in such circumstances. The regime is unable to get foreign currency due to the sanctions. If they use Bitcoin to circumvent the sanctions, then I don't think that the Americans will just sit back and watch.

And from what I have heard, the regime has adopted a tolerant attitude towards those Venezuelans who continue to use crypto. They are not harassing the cryptocurrency users. Perhaps they believe that Bitcoin is safer when compared to the USD. The national currency is now worth less than the toilet paper and it won't see a revival even if they ban Bitcoin. 

[atjiat]

The question of cryptocurrency in Venezuela is very acute, since it is the cryptocurrency that Venezuelans have very high hopes to survive in the poverty in which the whole country is located.  The fact is that in this state the dollar is under a state ban, and with cryptocurrency there are great opportunities for work.  It's just that Bitcoin is not the most popular among the local population, namely, the Dash cryptocurrency is the most popular in Venezuela.  But if you compare Dash and Petro, then Dash will really be able to translate the expected dreams of Venezuelans into reality, and Petro, the currency that the Venezuelan government created, is almost a profanity, behind the scenes of which lies a fraud.

[bitcon]

Bitcoin might be of some help mitigating the worst effects, I've heard of people who long ago realized holding the plain cash was a losing game and switched to Bitcoin as dollar and many currencies are not available to them.     So to a limited extent its helped but it cannot revive the economy.
  To really help Venezuela get back it would be something simple as oil prices going back over 100.   I dont really believe in this as a solution exactly but there is no doubt it would help raise revenue and justify much more extraction of their heavy sour oil.   Obviously they need reform and to rebuild and that is unlikely with a military led government suppressing any natural activity, I believe the military are now involved in facilitating drug trafficking to fund themselves and are unwilling to allow any transition away from the control which allows that.

Not only BTC, but other cryptocurrencies help Venezuela. DASH successfully continues to expand its presence in the country, which is connected both with the weakness of the sovereign Bolivar, the rate of which is constantly falling exponentially, and with the lack of other financial alternatives for the country's population - the “oil-backed” cryptocurrency El Petro still exists only in the president’s imagination and individual members of the government.

[LUCKMCFLY]

The independent solution of Venezuela, the only one I have seen is through Bitcoin Market. Now it only depends on them, if they know how to do it, they will overcome the crisis and all their problems almost by magic, but I clarify "If they know how to do it", otherwise, most likely given their ways of doing things, it is very feasible They don't handle it well and fail, unless they switch to financial advisors and hire experts. It is the only possible opportunity they have, there is no other, well, except that all rulers abandon and generate the hard step from communism to capitalism in a radical way.

[Brunus]

Venezuela has very big problems, which have very deep roots. The fact that he has potrolio makes him interested in the eyes of speculators, and combining currency will certainly not help economic development.

[mazdafunsun]

Bitcoin will not help with rebuilding while the current regime is in power, the currency is not the problem but the politics are.
BTC is just helping citizens with access to it to cope with the negative effects of this current regime .

[Silberman]

according to the news that I read, a bitcoin-based ATM was installed in Venezuela on September 10 yesterday. this proves that Venezuela is one place that is suitable for the development of bitcoin. This will facilitate the use of bitcoin, bitcoin cash, and dash on Venezuela. for more information about this, you can read in https://cointelegraph.com/news/after-multiple-false-starts-venezuela-may-have-its-first-bitcoin-atm

How is Venezuela suitable for developing the ecosystem?
Venezuelans do not have a lot of mine to buy amounts of bitcoin... They search for food in garbage bins.
If you want to develop the ecosystem you should bring a developed country to bitcoin embrace. Otherwise, nothing is going to happen and the condition will be stagnant.

This, while Venezuela could benefit from bitcoin the truth is that they have more serious problems to think about, the first one is that no matter what they do until they find a way for those at the top to give up their power then no measure is going to be effective in order to reconstruct their country, besides bitcoin is not ready for a country to fully adopt it so Venezuela will be better off by backing their currency with gold or silver or even better they could make gold and silver their official currencies.

[randegibran]

Venezuela have more extreme cases with their economic where their money do not have value any more, bitcoin could help cases of Venezuela but take step by step how to recovery their money value with using blockchain and bitcoin for the future.

[matchi2011]

Bitcoin will not help with rebuilding while the current regime is in power, the currency is not the problem but the politics are.
BTC is just helping citizens with access to it to cope with the negative effects of this current regime .

I agree with your statement, it's not Bitcoin that will helps rebuilding their economy but the leaders who's currently holding the power. Economy can be raised if the government who's facilitating the country are willing to take the lead, without any authorization from the government Bitcoin will serve as an asset that citizens can hold and expect for gaining higher  value after.

[Arsenyo]

Obviously it won't help Venezuela. Venezuela need an economy, not a currency. They need to eliminate the general crisis in this country and bitcoin doesn't solve economic issues. I completely don't understand their decision of moving towards bitcoin.

[Pearls Before Swine]

Obviously it won't help Venezuela. Venezuela need an economy, not a currency.

Yes, but you have to have a currency in order to create an economy.  But bitcoin?  I don't think Venezuelan citizens are turning to any particular crypto as a substitute for their local currency.  There may be instances of that but I've never read anything to indicate that its widespread.  What I've read is that they're using other currencies like the USD instead and this makes sense. 

Even before the crisis, there were a few countries in S. America using USD for transactions.  I've heard those crap dollar coins, the gold ones with presidents or Sacagawea on them, were being used in Ecuador.  If you see a worn out dollar coin in the states you can bet its seen heavy use in another country.

Instead of asking the question posed in the title, I'd like to see some evidence of what bitcoin is actually doing in Venezuela.  In other words, is it being used at all?  Has adoption increased since the crisis?  How many merchants are accepting it now and has this increased since the economy crashed?  Data is much better than just asking if Venezuela can be rebuilt with bitcoin's help.  I don't believe it can.

[Silberman]

Bitcoin will not help with rebuilding while the current regime is in power, the currency is not the problem but the politics are.
BTC is just helping citizens with access to it to cope with the negative effects of this current regime .

I agree with your statement, it's not Bitcoin that will helps rebuilding their economy but the leaders who's currently holding the power. Economy can be raised if the government who's facilitating the country are willing to take the lead, without any authorization from the government Bitcoin will serve as an asset that citizens can hold and expect for gaining higher  value after.

The government is the problem and not the solution, the Venezuelan government is the one that has created all the problems currently haunting its citizens and instead of trying to change course they are trying to do more of the same to solve the crisis, and anyone with a minimum understanding of logic will know this does not make sense, you cannot expect to fix something doing the same thing that broke it down on the first place, so the first thing Venezuelans must do is to change those that rule over them.

[dimonstration]

Venezuela have more extreme cases with their economic where their money do not have value any more, bitcoin could help cases of Venezuela but take step by step how to recovery their money value with using blockchain and bitcoin for the future.

They can also replace bitcoin as their currency in the future but not until they make their economy fixed. Their currency seems to have no value due to the extreme inflation of their product. Their political crisis must be solved before they can implement the use of cryptocurrency as their currency.

[bouren]

We have recently heard that the central govt of Venezuela is buying cryptocurrency to solidify their position a bit and fight with the current state of hyperinflation. I think this might be the last chance of Venezuela before they become the second Zimbawe. But they just have one thing to their advantage which is that they have natural resource in form of oil. They can sell it and buy some cryptocurrency and create some fiat backed by cryptocurrency. Last time I heard they were even trying to make petro cryptocurrency which too failed miserably.

[Sithara007]

Venezuela have more extreme cases with their economic where their money do not have value any more, bitcoin could help cases of Venezuela but take step by step how to recovery their money value with using blockchain and bitcoin for the future.

They can also replace bitcoin as their currency in the future but not until they make their economy fixed. Their currency seems to have no value due to the extreme inflation of their product. Their political crisis must be solved before they can implement the use of cryptocurrency as their currency.

Don't indulge in daydreaming. No country in the world is going to make cryptocurrency (Bitcoin or any of the altcoins) as the national currency. The truth is that they can't afford to do so. The economies around the world are surviving on printing huge amounts of fiat cash. This is not possible with Bitcoin as it operates on principles of controlled supply. If a particular country makes Bitcoin as its national currency, then it will face difficulty in balancing its budget, and to refinance its federal debt (which was accumulated during the previous years).

And the replacement of the national currency with cryptocurrency can have far reaching consequences. The banks and financial institutions will be closed down, as the citizens no longer need their services to store their money. Unless the banks find a way to integrate Bitcoin into their system, the entire banking setup will become obsolete. And what will happen to the existing loans and bank deposits? In Bitcoin, there is no concept of paying the interest, as it is a currency which is protected from inflation.

[alyssa85]

There are a lot of Venezuelans on Steemit, so I guess crypto in general is helping them earn a living.

I expect they exchange their steem for bitcoin and exchange the bitcoin for dollars or bolivars.

I think going forward alts will be more useful than bitcoin, especially if you can exchange them directly for fiat, or buy stuff with the alts.

[Xxmodded]

Instant helping is not ready for bitcoin to help Venezuela economic crisis but I think by adopting bitcoin will give good solution for Venezuela at the future, will have many advantage using bitcoin as legal payment and have higher price as investment assets, Venezuela could build back their economic crisis by using bitcoin or altcoin.

[yoseph]

Instant helping is not ready for bitcoin to help Venezuela economic crisis but I think by adopting bitcoin will give good solution for Venezuela at the future, will have many advantage using bitcoin as legal payment and have higher price as investment assets, Venezuela could build back their economic crisis by using bitcoin or altcoin.

Though it might help the people of Venezuela, i quite remember that Bitcoins and other cryptos have been banned in Venezuela by the government in favour of their own crypto which went on to fail miserably. With cheap cost of electrical consumption in Venezuela, mining wouldn't cost a lot and that would help alleviate the levels of poverty that's currently unprecednted in that country at the moment but only if the governments stops it crackdown on crypto mining.

[awik p]

Instant helping is not ready for bitcoin to help Venezuela economic crisis but I think by adopting bitcoin will give good solution for Venezuela at the future, will have many advantage using bitcoin as legal payment and have higher price as investment assets, Venezuela could build back their economic crisis by using bitcoin or altcoin.

Though it might help the people of Venezuela, i quite remember that Bitcoins and other cryptos have been banned in Venezuela by the government in favour of their own crypto which went on to fail miserably. With cheap cost of electrical consumption in Venezuela, mining wouldn't cost a lot and that would help alleviate the levels of poverty that's currently unprecednted in that country at the moment but only if the governments stops it crackdown on crypto mining.

but many miners now complain about getting a small fee, even in venezuela having experienced power cuts for 3 days. I think that revamping the economy in Venezuela must begin with a change in the government bureaucratic system, because we know that causing a crisis there, one of which is corruption by state officials

[Bitcoininvestment]

Bitcoin and other cryptos will help Venezuela through the help of giving them an opportunities to earn and get some profit. The people in Venezuela should make bitcoin illegalized to help them more efficiently and more smooth because if they not make it, it is too hard to transact and help them in earning and make money through everyday living.

[Sithara007]

Bitcoin and other cryptos will help Venezuela through the help of giving them an opportunities to earn and get some profit. The people in Venezuela should make bitcoin illegalized to help them more efficiently and more smooth because if they not make it, it is too hard to transact and help them in earning and make money through everyday living.

Bitcoin trading and Bitcoin mining is already legal in Venezuela and the government has even come up with its own cryptocurrency. But it hasn't helped the local economy though. And I am not very surprised. Cryptocurrency is not designed to help socialist nations such as Venezuela, where the economy was destroyed as a result of corruption, freebies and subsidies. And when people don't have any money to spend, how they can make profit for themselves by indulging in cryptocurrency trading? There is no magic pill to resolve the economic woes there. It will take a lot of time and some concrete actions by the regime. But they don't want to take those steps.

[qiwoman2]

I think Crypto and Blockchain technology itself can help many countries, as long as people, institutions and even governments are willing to take the best from it, adapt it for many purposes, like weeding corruption out and issuing transparency both on the Private and Public sector, as well as being more inclusive to underprivileged people in the local and macroeconomy of sorts. We need to see a more multi-layer involvement both from the ground up and from the top down to see any real impact in any society or country, including countries that are unstable like Venezuela for example.

[Silberman]

Instant helping is not ready for bitcoin to help Venezuela economic crisis but I think by adopting bitcoin will give good solution for Venezuela at the future, will have many advantage using bitcoin as legal payment and have higher price as investment assets, Venezuela could build back their economic crisis by using bitcoin or altcoin.

Though it might help the people of Venezuela, i quite remember that Bitcoins and other cryptos have been banned in Venezuela by the government in favour of their own crypto which went on to fail miserably. With cheap cost of electrical consumption in Venezuela, mining wouldn't cost a lot and that would help alleviate the levels of poverty that's currently unprecednted in that country at the moment but only if the governments stops it crackdown on crypto mining.

but many miners now complain about getting a small fee, even in venezuela having experienced power cuts for 3 days. I think that revamping the economy in Venezuela must begin with a change in the government bureaucratic system, because we know that causing a crisis there, one of which is corruption by state officials

And that is something they will never accept, the politicians currently in power are never going to recognize that they are the problem, they are going to blame everyone except themselves so they are never going to step out of their positions of power on their own, so the people of Venezuela do not really have a lot of options, I am not living in that country but if I was I would try to leave immediately since there is no way to fix this mess until the economy totally collapses.

[ecnalubma]

Bitcoin can't rebuild Venezuela, their economic status is a perfect example of how incompetent leaders handle a country.They can still save their country by ousting their leader and made him pay for the massive corruption. They need a leader with concern and an economist aware of solving their problems.