Is Zimbabwe Next (for Bitcoin Adoption)?
I'm sure I don't need to tell you about all the places where Bitcoin adoption is booming. Most cryptocurrency news sites already do a good job to point out the recent success stories:
- China is imposing capital controls on its citizens, causing many of them to turn to Bitcoin to send their money overseas.
- Venezuelans are using Bitcoin to bypass their country's similar capital controls and hyperinflation.
- India has started a war against paper currency, driving citizens to buy Bitcoin (now trading at about 1000 US dollars per coin in India).
- Nigeria has seen a massive outburst of Bitcoin traffic, with the price of one coin recently reaching 1250 US dollars.
However, there is another country going through economic turmoil, that has recently seen new capital controls imposed, which has not yet caught the attention of the crypto world, even though its money troubles have already made international news.
According to a recent BBC article, the government of Zimbabwe has confiscated all the money in every bank account in the country. If a Zimbabwean citizen withdraws funds from their bank account, instead of receiving US Dollars (the country's official currency) they will receive Zimbabwean "bond notes". Each of these notes is in theory equal in value to the US dollar and can in theory be exchanged for a dollar at some future point in time.
Sound familiar?
This trend is particularly troublesome, as Zimbabweans are still recovering from the nightmare of hyperinflation that haunted the country at the beginning of the 21st century. Zimbabwe was forced to abandon its own sovereign currency and adopt the US dollar only a few years ago, as the traditional Zimbabwean dollar's value was diluted by 231,000,000%.
As new warning signs arise in the form of Zimbabwe's capital controls, the question must be asked: is Zimbabwe next on the list of countries that will flock to Bitcoin? It's hard to say, at such an early stage, whether Bitcoin can be the solution to the country's money woes. However, other countries, such as Venezuela, could possibly serve as a template of things to come, and Bitcoin has proven itself as a hedge against inflation and a backdoor workaround to capital controls.
What do you think? Will Zimbabweans embrace Bitcoin? Is that even a good move for them to make? Please comment, as I believe that this issue is not getting enough press attention and needs more community discussion among crypto enthusiasts (and don't try denying that you are one).
Image Citations
- Zimbabwean dollars fresh off the press. Source: Associated Press
- Logo. Source: Bitcoin.org
If the people will start to use the bitcoin only in Zimbabwe, the government have the right to set control or at least it can even set it illegal from my point of view. I read this week on my board Bitcointalk that someone from Zimbabwe sold his castle in bitcoins.
Someone from Zimbabwe sold a castle using Bitcoin? Was the castle in Zimbabwe?
It's great to hear that Bitcoin may already have a presence in the country, but I still think it's fair to ask whether that presence will explode in Zimbabwe like it has in Venezuela.
Yes it was a castle in Zimbabwe ;)
I hardly doubt it, we have better chances in India, because in India people are already familiar with cryptos, whereas in africa people don't really put that much importance to online things yet.
Smartphone use has exploded in Africa. As I explained earlier in the article, coins are already selling in Nigeria for $1250. Zimbabwe may be on the opposite side of the continent, but there are enough similarities for us to consider that Bitcoin may be well received in Zimbabwe, especially now.
Nigeria is not all Africa, besides it has a lot of wealthy people there .
The majority of africans still live in huts, and poor villages. They might have wifi internet, but in some cases they dont. It will take a lot more innovation to get Africa into shape, but eventually in maybe 10-15 years we could see them adopting Bitcoin entirely.
I have hope in Africa, but they need to fix their famine and clean water issues first in my opinion.