Venezuela to pay pensioner Christmas bonuses in crypto

18 Nov 2019

VenezuelaThe president of Venezuela, Nicholas Maduro has announced that the country’s retirees and pensioners will receive their Christmas bonus in the national cryptocurrency, Petro.

The news was reported by Venepress on Sunday and is not the first time Venezuela has paid bonuses for pensions in cryptocurrency.

As reported last year by Coin Telegraph, Venezuela automatically converted pensioners’ 2018 bonuses into Petro.

Although this digital currency was first launched in February last year for a pre-sale, a few months later in August it as described by many as a “stunt” bolstered by a centralised and debt-riddled entity.

At the launch it was reported that the government was planning to appeal to foreign investors from countries such as Poland, Denmark and Norway, according to the country’s former Minister of Foreign Trade and International Investment José Vielma Mora.

However, despite the criticism, the national cryptocurrency and digital currencies in general are being increasingly pushed by local government.

Earlier this month, the Deputy of the National Constituent Assembly of Venezuela, Francisco Torrealba, stated he is of the opinion that all currencies will be replaced by cryptocurrencies.

Whilst talking about Venezuela, Torrealba said the country is faced with substantial change. He said: “The country is facing a change of time, a generational change,” adding that President Maduro is making a "great contribution" to the country by "crypto-monetising" transactions within the Venezuelan economy. He went on to say that "everything will be from this currency [the Petro]."

According to a report by AMB Crypto, the Venezuelan president said the country aims to establish a cryptocurrency payment method for its citizens. In addition, Venezuela’s national oil company, Petroleos de Venezuela SA has sought the inclusion of Bitcoin and Ethereum as payment options to the central bank.

Furthermore, as per a Coin Dance report, the weekly local Bitcoin volume in Venezuela reached a record high in the second week of this month, recording a volume of 144,150,090,255. 
 

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