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Toronto FC Striker Footballer Earns Half Of His Salary in Bitcoin

Nigerian professional footballer who plays for Major League Soccer (MLS) team Toronto FC Ifunanyachi Achara has joined a growing number of professional athletes taking their paycheck in cryptos.

Bitcoin for Remittances

The 23-year-old forward said that he collects half of his wages in Bitcoin through a third-party exchange service called Bitwage.

According to the forward, the major reason for his decision is due to rising inflation in his home continent. 

He also pointed to the US money-printing practices stating this was further devaluing the Nigerian naira.

Achara says he prefers sending Bitcoin as a substitute for fiat to his family in Nigeria.

“If I wanted to send money to my parents to move away from a state that I felt like was really violent, I couldn’t,” Achara said. “I couldn’t send them money to the bank. It was just through Bitcoin that I was able to send my family money more easily and efficiently as fast as possible,” he added.

Achara’s announcement follows on the back of Kansas City Chiefs tight end Sean Culkin who said he would be converting his entire NFL salary into Bitcoin for the 2021 fiscal year.

Another crypto adherent has been California Panther’s Russell Okung, who is working with crypto startup Strike for his BTC payments.

Achara is also buying into the favorite narrative of crypto enthusiasts who see Bitcoin as a store of value.

According to the Toronto striker, Bitcoin is a hedge against growing inflation in the West African nation. The Nigerian naira crossed the 18% mark in March following a four-year high.

Bitcoin also plays a crucial role in reducing wire transfer fees due to its decentralized nature. Because no central authority controls the Bitcoin blockchain network, foreign nationals only have to worry about network fees.

Nigerians Shun Naira For Foreign Currencies

According to a Bloomberg report, Nigerians are accumulating foreign currencies to hedge against naira volatility and rising inflation.

The statement, which was contained in a research paper published by the country’s apex bank, noted that higher real-exchange rate volatility is associated with an increased level of currency substitution.

It further pointed out that the ratio of foreign cash deposits to naira deposits on-demand in commercial banks surpassed the International Monetary Fund’s 30% threshold due to the global financial crisis occasioned by the pandemic.

Although this figure may be disturbing, the paper also pointed out that the naira lost 66% of its value in 2009 when it got exchanged at 149 Naira for a dollar, and with rising inflation, Nigerians are frantically looking for ways to protect their wealth.

Achara’s decision to send Bitcoin to his family is just one indication of a fast-eroding financial system where fiat no longer retains value due to continued money-printing practices by the government.

Toronto FC Striker Footballer Earns Half Of His Salary in Bitcoin

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Mass adoption looms as South America’s second-largest company accepts crypto payments

On April 28, MercadoLibre (MELI), the largest Latin American online marketplace, launched a real estate section dedicated to cryptocurrencies. Although the company does not settle property transactions directly, it legitimizes the category as a payment system. 

The $81 billion retailer is the second largest company in South America and is present in 18 countries, including its three largest markets, Brazil, Argentina, and Mexico.

The group also owns Mercado Pago, a digital payments system for online and offline transactions, along with Mercado Envios, a logistics platform that provides fulfillment, warehousing, and shipping services.

The current offers include houses, condos, vacant lots, land and commercial real estate located in Buenos Aires, Santa Fe, and Cordoba.

A new use-case for cryptocurrency in South America

Although this might seem like a niche market, over 300 real estate agents took part in Mercado Libre’s webinar explaining the basic mechanics of cryptocurrencies and their potential impact on the sector. The news might have had a reduced impact as less than 90 offers have been placed in the section, and the prices continue to be displayed in U.S. dollars.

As is already the case with properties paid in U.S. dollars, Argentine pesos, or Brazilian reais, the transaction is handled outside the Mercado Libre platform and combined between the parties. Thus, after choosing the property of preference, the buyer contacts the real estate agent and requests to carry out the transaction in cryptocurrency at the deal closing exchange rate.

However, what analysts might have failed to foresee is the potential of Bitcoin (BTC), Ether (ETH), and Tether (USDT) to effectively serve as a means of exchange in Argentina.

As stated by Juan Manuel Carretero, the commercial manager for vehicles and real estate at Mercado Libre:

“Probably, as cryptocurrencies become widespread, it will no longer be a separate section, but a payment option filter like any other.”

According to Statista, Mercado Libre’s gross merchandise volume accounts for 25.4% of all e-commerce sales in Latin America. Its sales are expected to reach $25 billion in 2021. Therefore, capturing 5% of the $1.25 billion in volume generated each year.

Countries with inflation issues could lead cryptocurrency adoption

Argentina might end up being the poster-child for cryptocurrency adoption as the country’s gross domestic product declined by 10% in 2020, and its cumulative inflation hit 42.6% over the last 12 months.

Considering that people have been limited to purchasing $200 of foreign banknotes per month by the central bank, cryptocurrencies have been effectively functioning as a store of wealth for its citizens.

It may be just a question of time regarding how long it will be before cryptocurrencies gain center-stage as one of the leading digital payment options and marketplaces in Latin America. Meanwhile, the real estate dedicated section should be interpreted as a test drive for consumer demand.

The views and opinions expressed here are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of Cointelegraph. Every investment and trading move involves risk. You should conduct your own research when making a decision.

Mass adoption looms as South America\’s second-largest company accepts crypto payments

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New Milestone Reached: 100 Cryptocurrencies Hit a Market Capitalization of $1 Billion

Are you a crypto enthusiast? Want to get updated and stay tuned regarding the crypto sector? This article has got you covered. 

Table of Contents 

  • What’s This New Milestone All About?
  • Driving Forces for the Growth of Crypto Ecosystem
  • Concluding Lines 

What’s This New Milestone All About?

As cryptocurrencies continue to gain traction among investors and traders, the crypto sector has risen to a total valuation of more than $1.2 trillion. In Feb 2021, it was seen that there were more than 55 unicorn status projects that had a market capitalization of over $1 billion at that time. 

Now, according to Cointelegraph, there has been a surge in the number of crypto projects. It reports that a new milestone has been reached as 100 cryptocurrencies reach a $1B market capitalization.

Want to get started with cryptocurrencies? Become a Certified Cryptocurrency Expert now!

Driving Forces for the Growth of Crypto Ecosystem

Now comes the question, what are the significant factors that are responsible for the growth of the crypto ecosystem. Let’s explore all these factors in detail.

Multi-Billion Dollar Companies Investing in Cryptocurrencies 

One of the driving forces that contribute to multi-billion dollar companies such as Tesla, MicroStrategy, and others.

MicroStrategy, which is a prominent business analytics platform, has adopted Bitcoin as its primary reserve asset. Unlike other CEOs who generally hide their personal investments, he announced in October 2020 that he holds around 17,732 BTC. In December 2020, the company announced that it had raised $650 million worth of convertible bonds to finance more Bitcoin purchases. 

Also, in February 2021, it was announced that electric vehicle manufacturer Tesla has invested $1.5 billion in Bitcoin and is expected to begin accepting the digital token for its cars and other products. After the announcement, it was seen that the BTC price soared. Square bought $170 million worth of bitcoin with the belief that BTC has the potential to become the native cryptocurrency of the internet. 

DeFi Takes Center Stage 

For the past year, Decentralized Finance, also commonly known as DeFi, has been one of the most contributing factors in the growth and development of the cryptocurrency sector. 

For instance, Uniswap, a decentralized exchange (DEX), has evolved from a basic exchange framework dApp to a sprawling trading network with an average trading volume of $6.72 billion. Similarly, SushiSwap, a competitor to Uniswap, has also attained unicorn status with a current value of over $1.8 billion. Moreover, PancakeSwap (CAKE), a BSC-based DEX that promotes the trading of BEP-20 tokens and implements AMM, is recently gaining attraction, rapidly climbing up the charts, ranking as the fifth-largest DeFi platform by total value locked, with $6.18 billion currently locked in the protocol.

At the time of writing, the total DeFi crypto market cap is $95.83B. 

Stablecoins and their Associated Protocols Received a Boost 

After the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency of the United States of America provided the clear run for national banks to run independent nodes for distributed ledger networks, stablecoins gained momentum. 

One protocol with a stablecoin component that is helping in establishing a stable store of wealth in nations undergoing hyperinflation like Venezuela is Reserve, whose Reserve Rights (RSR) token has increased by around 400% this year. Another emerging entrant to the field of stablecoin is TerraUSD (UST), whose market cap skyrocketed from $182 million on January 1 to $1.66 billion on April 2. 

Interest in Non-Fungible Tokens is Surging

Non-Fungible Tokens (NFTs) have been around for a while, but their value has skyrocketed in the last few months. As interest in NFTs is surging by celebrities and influencers, it is bringing more sales and distribution worldwide. It was announced that Christie’s auction house sold its first NFT-linked digital art for $69 million.

As NFTs are becoming popular, Enjin Coin (ENJ) has been one of the biggest beneficiaries. On March 15, ENJ witnessed an all-time high of $3.08 and raised the project to Unicorn status with a $2.6 billion market capitalization.

Decentraland (MANA), a virtual reality network that allows the acquisition of digital plots of land that can be created and monetized, and Flow (FLOW), a blockchain intended to be the framework for “the next generation of games, applications, and the digital assets that fuel them, are two other prominent NFT-related additions to the Unicorn club.

Concluding Lines 

This has brought us to the end of our discussion. From the above discussion, we can infer that crypto space is going to bring revolutionary changes that none of us ever imagined.
As this space is continuously growing and showing no sign of slowing down, scope for Crypto Experts is booming. 

If you want to gain all the ins and outs of cryptocurrencies and become a Certified Crypto Expert, get started today with Blockchain Council. 

To get instant updates about Blockchain Technology and to learn more about online Blockchain Certifications, check out Blockchain Council. 

New Milestone Reached: 100 Cryptocurrencies Hit a Market Capitalization of $1 Billion

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DeFi’s money markets are finally luring in institutional investors

Bitcoin’s bull run from last year has caused even some of its biggest skeptics to soften their stance. From economists to hedge fund managers, the world is opening itself up to technology, and at the center of this movement is decentralized finance, or DeFi. While the market capitalization of all cryptocurrencies has hit $2 trillion, worth as much as Apple, it’s the promise of DeFi — a small corner of the blockchain industry today — that’s grabbing the attention of institutional investors.

As Bitcoin’s (BTC) bullish trend persists, interest-bearing crypto products have become all the rage. Some services offer up to 8% returns on Bitcoin holdings. For investors who are already expecting a rise in value, this can be incredibly useful for maintaining cash flow without selling any assets.

The three main factors solidifying institutional interest in Bitcoin are the current historically low interest rates, the inflation rate and geopolitical instability. With near-zero interest rates expected for the foreseeable future, investors are gearing up to move their funds into alternative locations for securing wealth.

The United States Federal Reserve’s 2% inflation target has incited concern in investors fearing devaluation, and with tensions between the U.S. and China on a precarious edge, portfolios denominated in U.S. dollars are becoming riskier by the day.

A market for money

Buying, storing and using cryptocurrencies securely is still quite a complex ordeal — far more involved than setting up a bank account. However, according to Larry Fink, the CEO of BlackRock — a global investment management fund with nearly $9 trillion in assets under management — Bitcoin could evolve into a global market asset and achieve new highs in the upcoming years.

In the traditional financial system, money markets are parts of the economy that issue short-term funds. They usually deal with loans for periods of a year or less, and offer services like borrowing and lending, buying and selling, with wholesale trading taking place over the counter. Money markets are composed of short-term, highly liquid assets and are part of the broader financial markets system.

Money markets are traditionally very complicated, with expensive overheads and hidden fees pushing most investors to hire a fund manager. However, their existence is paramount to operating a modern financial economy. They incentivize people to lend money in the short term and allocate capital toward productive use. This improves the overall market’s efficiency while helping financial institutions meet their goals. Basically, anyone with extra cash on hand can earn interest on deposits.

Money markets are composed of different kinds of securities, such as short-term treasuries, certificates of deposits, repurchase agreements and mutual funds, among others. These funds generally consist of shares that cost $1.

On the other hand, capital markets are dedicated to the trade of long-term debt and equity instruments, and point to the entire stock and bond market. Using a computer, anyone can purchase or sell assets in mere seconds, but companies issuing the stock do so to raise funds for more long-term operations. These stocks fluctuate, and unlike money market products, they have no expiration date.

Since money market investments are virtually risk-free, they often come with meager interest rates as well. This means that they will not produce huge gains or display substantial growth, compared with riskier assets like stocks and bonds.

DeFi vs. the world?

To hedge against currency risk, institutions have started using Bitcoin, and retail investors are following their lead. More than 60% of Bitcoin’s circulating supply hasn’t moved since 2018, and BTC is predicted to push well above $100,000 in the next 24 months.

If the current trend carries forward, investors will continue to stockpile BTC. However, while much of the supply of the world’s first cryptocurrency remains in storage, the DeFi industry is constantly producing alternative platforms for interest-bearing payments through smart contracts, which increases transparency by allowing investors to view and track on-chain funds.

The average return for DeFi products is also much higher than in traditional money markets, with some platforms even offering double-digit annual percentage yields on deposits. From asset management to auditing smart contracts, the DeFi space is creating decentralized infrastructure for scalable money markets.

According to Stani Kulechov, co-founder of the Aave DeFi protocol, rates are high during bull markets because the funds are used to leverage more capital, with the cost of margin pushing up the yield. “New innovation in DeFi is consuming more stablecoins, which further increases the yield. Unless there is a new capital injection — these rates might stick for a while,” he said.

The Ethereum network currently hosts most of the DeFi applications, and this has barred tokens that aren’t available on the network from participating in decentralized finance. Bitcoin, for example, despite being the largest cryptocurrency by market capitalization, has only recently found its way onto DeFi platforms.

Related: DeFi yield farming, explained

With Kava’s Hard Protocol, investors can yield farm using Bitcoin and other non-ERC-20 tokens like XRP and Binance Coin (BNB). Backed by some prominent names (Ripple, Arrington XRP Capital and Digital Asset Capital Management, among others), the platforms allow users to stake their cryptocurrencies into a pool of assets, which is lent out to borrowers to generate interest.

The team also plans to add support for Ethereum-based tokens in the near future. The network’s upgrade to Kava 5.1, which was postponed to April 8 after failing to reach the required quorum, will also introduce the Hard Protocol V2, bringing powerful incentivization schemes and enhancements to its governance model.

Most loans in DeFi are overcollateralized, meaning the pool always has more money than it lends out. In case the value of the issued token drops, funds in the pool are liquidated to compensate.

According to Anton Bukov, co-founder of decentralized exchange aggregator 1inch, blockchains are the first-ever unbiased executors in human history — very limited, but ultimately fair — and could deliver new services and new flows of interactions in future. “Developers are doing their best to solve potential dishonesty issues of existing flows and invent new flows by replacing intermediaries,” he said.

By creating an automated platform to borrow and lend assets, decentralized finance enables money markets without intermediaries, custodians or the high fees that stem from high infrastructural costs.

Honest work

Of the many trends DeFi has set into motion over the last few years, yield farming has attracted quite a lot of attention. Yield farming is when the network rewards liquidity providers with tokens that can be further invested into other platforms to generate more liquidity tokens.

Simple in concept, yield farmers are some of the most vigilant traders out there, constantly switching up their strategies to maximize their yield and tracking rates across all platforms to ensure they’re getting the sweetest deal. The potential rate of return can become obscenely high, but it’s still unclear whether yield farming is just a fad or a phenomenon in the making. Kulechov added:

“Yield farming is simply a way to distribute governance power to users and stakeholders. What actually matters is whether the product itself would find protocol market/fit. Most successful governance power distributions with yield farming have been with protocols that have found protocol market/fit before such programs.”

Yield farming has an incredibly positive feedback loop, with an increase in participation pushing the value of its governance token up, driving further growth. According to Kava CEO Brian Kerr, while this feedback loop can produce very positive results in bull markets, it can have entirely the opposite effects in falling markets:

“It will be up to the governance groups of the various projects to navigate bear markets effectively, by ratcheting back rewards before a full-on death spiral occurs. Regardless of bull or bear markets, yield farming will be a mainstay in blockchain projects for years to come.”

Money markets are the pillars of our global financial system, but most of its transactions occur between financial institutions like banks and other companies in time deposit markets. However, some of these transactions do find their way to consumers through money market mutual funds and other investment vehicles.

Decentralization is the next frontier for finance, and as prominent investors continue to engage with the DeFi space, a decentralized economy seems all but inevitable. Participating in the burgeoning environment may be a risky bet today, but what decentralized finance platforms learn now will be the foundation of the robust DeFi applications of the future. According to Bukov, the higher interest rates of DeFi platforms are “absolutely sustainable.” He added:

“Higher profits are usually involved with higher risks. So the risk-profit model of all these opportunities is always nearly balanced. Normalizing risks would decrease profits because more participants will join to share the rewards.”

From smart contract malfunctions to the unauthorized withdrawal of community funds, the DeFi space is a place of both miracles and nightmares. DeFi-based yield farming platforms are still in their very early stages, and while the numbers can be all too tempting at times, it’s crucial to do your own research before investing in any platform or asset.

DeFi’s money markets are finally luring in institutional investors

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Governments are looking to buy Bitcoin, NYDIG CEO confirms

State-owned investment funds are reportedly making inquiries into buying Bitcoin (BTC).

According to Robert Gutmann, CEO of New York Digital Investment Group, the firm has been having conversations with sovereign wealth funds about possible Bitcoin investments.

Gutmann made this known while appearing at a virtual podcast with investment strategist and founder of Real Vision Raoul Pal.

Pal also confirmed Gutmann’s revelation, stating that Singapore’s sovereign wealth fund Temasek was indeed a Bitcoin investor.

According to Pal, Temasek which holds about $306 billion in assets under management, has been buying virgin Bitcoin from miners.

Tweeting on Thursday, Pal characterized the imminent entry of sovereign wealth funds into the Bitcoin space as a “wall of money.”

Indeed, since publicly-listed firms like MicroStrategy and Tesla began holding BTC on their balance sheets, there has been speculation about whether governments would follow suit.

Drawing parallels between the appeal of Bitcoin for public firms and sovereign wealth funds, Gutmann touched on the desire of institutional investors to hedge their dollar-denominated liabilities.

According to Gutmann, investors are re-evaluating their portfolios, adding:

“If you look at the world today on a forward basis, it is reasonable to be asking yourself as an investment committee or as an allocation committee [if] having all of [their] assets denominated in dollars against dollar-denominated liabilities is the right allocation mix.”

Back in August 2020, upon announcing its first Bitcoin purchase, MicroStrategy CEO Michael Saylor touched on the long-term value of BTC vis-à-vis the depreciating value of cash over time.

Earlier in March, Russ Koesterich, portfolio manager at BlackRock’s Global Allocation Fund characterized gold’s status as an inflation hedge as being exaggerated.

Bitcoin is currently down 8% over the last 24 hours in what is likely an upside price dislocation given the significant decline in the volume of Bitcoin held on exchanges. Despite the current drop, BTC is still up about 78% year-to-date.

Governments are looking to buy Bitcoin, NYDIG CEO confirms

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