Content adapted from this Zerohedge.com article : Source
The Petro is still trying to get off the ground.
Venezuela is now offering a 30% discount to India if it uses the Petro to pay for the oil purchases.
This is another attempt for the Government of Venzuela to get around sanctions placed by the United States. It is also a means to circumvent their fiat currency which is all but destroyed.
Authored by Tsvetana Paraskova via OilPrice.com,
Venezuela has offered India a 30-percent discount on crude oil purchases, but only if India agrees to pay in El Petro, the cryptocurrency that Venezuela is touting as the first national digital currency backed by crude oil reserves, the Indian outlet Business Standard reports.
Venezuelan blockchain department experts visited India in March and struck an agreement with Delhi-based Bitcoin trading firm Coinsecure to sell the Venezuelan cryptocurrency Petro in India, Business Standard reported, quoting multiple sources.
Maduro's propaganda machine is touting the digital coin as a 'ground-breaking' first-ever national crypto currency, El Petro—backed by 5 billion barrels of oil reserves in Venezuela's Orinoco Belt. But most observers see this crypto issuance as a desperate attempt to skirt U.S. financial sanctions.
In March 2018, U.S. President Donald Trump banned U.S. purchases, transactions, and dealings of any digital coin or token issued for or by the government of Venezuela.
Now Venezuela wants to add the Petro as a cryptocurrency on Coinsecure to trade Petro against Bitcoin and the Indian rupee, according to Coinsecure CEO Mohit Kalra quoted by Business Standard.
"They are going to different countries and making offers. The offer that they have given to the Indian government is: you buy Petro and we will give you a 30 per cent discount on oil purchases," Kalra told Business Standard.
Earlier this month, Coinsecure said that US$3.5 million worth of Bitcoins had been stolen from the exchange and blamed for this its Chief Security Officer (CSO) Amitabh Saxena. Investigation is still under way, Coinsecure said on Sunday.
Meanwhile, India's crude imports from Venezuela - whose oil industry is collapsing rapidly - dropped to around 300,000 bpd between November 2017 and February 2018, down by 20 percent on the year, to the lowest level since 2012, Reuters reported in March, citing data from shipping and industry sources.
Non-adapted content found at zerohedge.com: Source
Hi i am from venezuela and our president is just crazy
We need it out of government. We need a new president
cheers.
You guys need someone like Trump!! MVGA
the strategies are working the petro currency will be successful I have no doubt about that, then the other cryptocurrencies issued by other countries will come
Venezuela can increase the oil supply so increase the USD value. By using crypto to sell oil they just avoid to increase the USD value by creating demand for it.
USA could be happy that Venezuela is not a threat to their money so to their economy anymore by having some control over the USD value. But of course if other countries use crypto too the problem will be that no one will need USD to buy oil, and that will make the USD value go down, what is not necessary what the USA need or want (a fiat currencie need to have a value that make import/export balance sustainable).
Saddam Hussein wanted to sell oil for EUR, Kadhafi for Dinar, we know what happened ... hoping the US governement is dumb enough to think the Venezuelian/Indian move is just a try and will fail in the long run, that could lead to a USD independence for oil/gaz trading so to more peace (or less war) in the world.
i'm not against cryptos, but petro its a scam. our "beloved president" brought our country to the crisis, to bankruptcy from the first year since I inherited the presidential chair with the oil barrel to $ 100 in that time.
Desperate times requires desperate measures, I would consider "El Petro" a failure, and this discount is another try to make this coin viable, because Venezuela really needs something like this to give them some air to breathe again.