President of Venezuela Nicolas Maduro launched the petro this week, the first cryptocurrency to be backed by a country. According to a story in the Washington Post, each petro is supposedly backed by a barrel of oil. The cryptocurrency is designed to profit from Venezuela’s oil reserves without producing it. Maduro has made available $6 billion worth of petro, each sold for $60 and only purchasable with US dollars. The petro, unlike Venezuela’s official currency the bolivar, will not be regulated by a central bank. Maduro’s cryptocurrency play is an urgent one for a country deep in debt. The government sold $375 million worth of petro on its first day of trading, the equivalent of 6.25 million barrels of oil.
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