Latin America - Need to Know
The politics of crypto, Bitcoin and digital infrastructure in Latin America this week.
I hope you are having a great Friday. Thanks again for reading Barracuda.
Earlier this week I wrote about:
Here are some of the most important updates on bitcoin, blockchain and digital infrastructure policy, power and politics from this past week.
In Mexico, Tether, the company behind the leading stablecoin USDT, launched its new currency MXNT: a token that is pegged to the value of the Mexican peso. A study by Triple A claims that 40% of Mexican companies want to adopt crypto or deploy blockchain technology.
Mexican RedGirasol is raising funds for a small solar mining facility in Puebla. Mauricio de Muchas says the company has obtained a Fintech license and the funds will go toward purchasing ASIC miners.
El Salvador’s El Zonte Capital says that Hong Kong-based Bitfinex is making an investment into the fund run by Bitcoin investors Max Keiser and Stacy Herbert. Salvadoran researcher Ricardo Valencia drew a comparison between a slice of Tether reserves denominated in non-US govt bonds and the amount someone on 9 May paid for $286mn in LaGEO tokenized securities.
These tokenized securities appear to behave like stock in LaGEO, El Salvador’s state-run geothermal energy unit. It seems that El Zonte Capital is acting as a broker between Bitfinex and the Bukele government’s initiative to push funds into LaGEO’s accounts. LaGEO needs to raise cash in order to build out geothermal well capacity for Bitcoin mining to flourish.
Venezuelan Canguro, an electronics store, adopted PetroPago for receiving crypto payments. Users of the PetroApp, Venezuela’s government-sponsored crypto app, can use the terminal to pay for electronics with crypto.
Chile’s Central Bank is working with Alberto Naudon to launch Peso Digital, an early step in the bank’s entry into digital currencies. Naudon is close to former president Michelle Bachelet.
The FBI and Brazilian intelligence agencies are working together to crack down on financial crimes involving crypto currencies. To strengthen the prevention of fraud involving bitcoin (BTC) and other cryptocurrencies, 80 Brazilian law enforcement officers are working together with agents from the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) on the project.
Argentina’s Bitex was snapped up by Chinese Huobi on 26 May. The terms of the acquisition were not revealed but this is another material demonstration of how China-based exchanges are penetrating Latin American economies with crypto.
Paraguay’s Bitcoin mining law will allow miners to tap greater volumes of electricity. The law seeks to regulate miners as industrial actors and tries to paint a clear legal framework for attracting large-scale Bitcoin mining. Paraguay has excessive power at its Itaipú hydroelectric dam.