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Tsvetana Paraskova

Tsvetana Paraskova

Tsvetana is a writer for Oilprice.com with over a decade of experience writing for news outlets such as iNVEZZ and SeeNews. 

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Venezuela Is Recruiting Miners For Its Cryptocurrency

Maduro PDVSA

Venezuela is moving ahead with plans to “overcome the financial blockade” by launching an oil-backed cryptocurrency known as Petro, and is now recruiting miners nationwide.

The Unique Registry of Digital Mining that Venezuela has created will be open until January 21, according to local newspaper El Impulso. Registration to the registry is a requirement for natural and legal persons to have access to Venezuela’s Petro cryptocurrency.

In early December, Venezuela’s President Nicolas Maduro shocked both analysts who follow the country’s flirting with default and the cryptocurrency community by announcing that Venezuela wanted to launch the petro cryptocurrency, backed by oil, diamonds, and gold reserves, to help the country to “advance in issues of monetary sovereignty, to make financial transactions and overcome the financial blockade.”

At the end of December, Venezuela’s Communications Minister Jorge Rodríguez said that the country was getting ready to launch within days its own digital currency—El Petro—which will be backed by more than 5.3 billion barrels of oil and support US$267 billion worth of financial instruments.

Earlier last week, Maduro said that the 5 billion barrels of oil reserves at the Ayacucho block 1 in Venezuela’s Orinoco Belt would back the cryptocurrency.

According to Maduro, as many as 860,800 young people have signed up to mine the Petro so far. Related: OPEC Should Thank Venezuela For Falling Production

“We are going to call them a special cryptocurrency team…[They will] set up cryptocurrency mining farms in all states and municipalities of the country,” local media quoted Maduro as saying.

Venezuela also plans to use the Petro to pay suppliers and avoid imports delays because banks are delaying payments to scrutinize operations in the wake of the stricter U.S. sanctions, according to El Impulso.

The delays will end once the Petro is used for transactions, Minister Rodríguez said, adding that “It will be materially impossible for the dictatorial financial centers of the world to intervene against this initiative.”

By Tsvetana Paraskova for Oilprice.com

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  • John Brown on January 04 2018 said:
    This crap coming from Maduro is so stupid. Any moron that signs up for Venezuelan crypto currency is out of their mind? Backed by oil, gold, and diamond. That folks is what backs the current Venezuelan currency, the Bolivar, and its worthless. Venezuelan oil production has been dropping like a rock even though the country has the worlds largest reserves because corruption has stolen the national oil company blind and they haven't invested in maintenance and infrastructure for years, and if Venezuela had oodles of Gold and Diamonds available the Bolivar would be rock solid, and again its WORTHLESS.
    All those delayed imports are because Venezuela has NO money, no gold, and not nearly enough oil to pay for that stuff. The idea that Venezuela has a supply of oil, gold, and diamonds sitting around to pay for stuff is absurd. If it did it would have no issues buying anything. Even if the USA didn't want to do business with them everyone else in the world, especially China and Russia would be happy to sell Venezuela things like toilet paper for oil, gold, and diamonds.
    The deal here folks is if you buy the PETRO, and you want to convert it to oil, gold, or diamonds you're going to have to go drill or mine for those things yourself, because Venezuela can't. If it could they wouldn't need to invent a worthless crypto currency because everyone would be happy to take Bolivars, or they could sell those things for dollars on the Global Market and then buy whatever they want. Venezuela is busted, and its still falling fast.
  • Roger spring on January 04 2018 said:
    This cannot turn out well for the buyers of this currency. Any financial scheme run by Socialists is doomed...
  • Citizen Oil on January 04 2018 said:
    This whole cryptocurrency idiocy is going to come crashing down soon. Right now people are still in the throes of the speculation. i suggest Venezuela change their name to "Blockchain incorporated " and they may pull this off with all the naive "investors" out there. Seriously though, the governments of the world should put an end to this stupidity before it takes valid markets down with it.

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