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Venezuela to launch pre-sale of “petro” cryptocurrency

Venezuela to launch pre-sale of “petro” cryptocurrency

Mubasher: Venezuela’s government on Monday announced it would issue a pre-sale of a commodity-backed new digital currency called “Petro”.

Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro claimed that about 100 million petro tokens worth $6 billion would be issued, hoping that the digital currency could get around US and European sanctions.

“Petro” would be backed by Venezuela’s oil, gas, gold and diamond reserves, attracting investors from Qatar, Turkey, and the Middle East, along with traders from US and the European Union (EU).

The issuance, due Tuesday 20 February, comes amid a political uncertainty in the OPEC-member country, as the Economist Intelligence Unit's Democracy Index downgraded Venezuela from a "hybrid regime" to an "authoritarian regime" in 2017.

On a separate note, cryptocurrency market recovered markedly on Monday as bitcoin last rose 1.77% to $11,034.4, while ethereum and ripple gained 0.21% and 0.71% to $951.04 and $1.15, respectively.

While, cryptocurrency's total market capitalisation last reached around $501 billion.