Highlights

Bitcoin Volume continues to increase in Venezuela

This comes even after the Bolivar showing signs of stabilization

Increase in Bitcoin Interest

Coin.dance, a Bitcoin specific information forum, reported that it saw the highest volume of Bitcoin trading in and around Venezuela last week. As on 2nd September, Coin.dance reported that the volume of trades held on P2P exchanges such as LocalBitcoins.com saw more interest in Bitcoins than ever before. About 114 Billion Bolivars worth of Bitcoin has been bought and sold.

Just the week before, the total volume traded was around 77 billion bolivars. Meaning that in just over a week, Bitcoin saw an increase in interest of more than 50%.

Venezuela’s Savior

Over the past few years Venezuela, due to its hostile political climate, has been undergoing rampant hyperinflation with the Bolivar devaluing as much as 300,000% YoY in July 2019. This number is nothing when compared to the 2,690,000% fall YoY in January. This uncertain political and economic climate has led a large portion of the population lose faith and interest in the sovereign currency.

The country’s attempt to curtail economic meltdown by introducing the world’s first sovereign digital currency – the Petro hasn’t see much traction either. The government has promised that it has been continuously developing on the Petro digital currency, but the general public seems to have turned a blind eye. The people are more interested in Bitcoin, Dash and ZCash rather than the dying Bolivar or Petro.

It is fascinating to note that the crypto Bull run in late 2017, despite its reputation for being the “Crypto Bubble”, was at least 1,000,000% more profitable than holding the Bolivar during the same time period.

Record Breaking Volume

Bitcoin, with its reputation for breaking records, has been gradually amassing interest throughout the world. The sudden increase in interest and trade volume isn’t just local to Venezuela. Countries like China, South Korea, Hong Kong, Japan have all reported record breaking demand for Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies the past year. It can be said that a newfound interest for cryptocurrencies has sparked, which could be correlated to the awaited block halving in 2020.