It is no longer secret that Argentina's economy is in complete turmoil, with its overall inflation rate hitting a whopping 20.6% last year. Citizens are struggling under the high inflation rate, with prices of fuel doubling and the value of the countries pesos halved. An Al Jazeera documentary even documented how restaurants gave up exhibiting prices because food prices are going up too fast to print.
Leading the adoption of cryptocurrency among Western countries amid 276% inflation spike
In April this year, the annual inflation rate of Argentina was recorded to be at 276%. But amidst this, the country's adoption rate of cryptocurrency users is higher than ever. Here are things you have to know about Argentina's crypto activity:
- Data from Similarweb shows that out of the 130 million visitors to 55 of the largest exchanges worldwide, 2.5 million of those traffic came from Argentina.
- Argentina also ranks the highest percentage of Binance traffic. According to SimilarWeb, website traffic from Argentina accounts for 6.9% of Binance's total visits.
The adoption of cryptocurrency and how that would aid Argentina's economy?
So where does cryptocurrency fit into the picture? You see, experts have noticed the peculiar conduct of Argentine investors, which is that they often buy USDT (one of the stablecoins of Tether) and then hang onto it without making any purchases. Experts have also noticed that Argentine investors are steering clear of memecoin and flocking towards stablecoins like Tether instead. This essentially underscores the fact that Argentines are using cryptocurrencies primarily as a foundation for financial security, rather than a tool to earn money. Through the buying and storing of stable coins, it allows them to avoid the volatility of the declining Pesos as well as the more volatile cryptocurrencies.
The media paints Milei as the hope of crypto
When Javier Milei first took over the office, many were excited that a "pro-crypto" president had finally taken over the office. Many were also speculating on the rosy future of Argentina and how Milei would finally bring Argentina out of its economic slum through the adoption of cryptocurrencies.
But it seems that this idea of Milei pushing Argentina towards bitcoin is just a misconception promoted by the media who painted this inaccurate depiction of Milei.
This tweet translates as
"There will be free competition of currencies, so if you want to use Bitcoin there will be no problems... and you can also use other units such as WTI, BTU and the one that is most appropriate for your business..."
Now media companies have pointed to this tweet as evidence, stating that Milei is just a proponent of open trade. Calling him pro-crypto might be pushing it a little too far.
Actually Milei had made it quite clear from the get-go the policies he was pushing for. Since entering the office, Milei has always advocated a dollarization approach toward Argentina's economic problem - a move that would involve adopting the US dollar as a fiat currency. None of his approach towards solving the economic turmoil in Argentina has ever involved cryptocurrency.
Can Argentina really escape its economic slump?
Right now, Argentinians are still suffering from the pangs of the ungodly inflation, and whether Milei's solution of dollarisation would work or not would take many years to take effect. But do you think cryptocurrency could be the magic formula to Argentina's economic recovery? What if, instead of the dollarisation of Argentina, the government proposed a Cryptorization of the country instead, where the country would change their currency to only crypto, similar to what El Salvador is doing. Would you think that would be a better proposal instead?