February 14, 2022 Newsletter

February 7, 2022

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Good morning, EmergingCrypto.io subscribers.

EmergingCrypto.io Weekly Update February 6 - February 12

Latin America

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Moss.Earth sells NFTs for ownership of Amazon forest to prevent deforestation

If you're perusing OpenSea for something "good" to buy, instead of purchasing cartoon apes or JPEGs of rocks, how about purchasing a hectare of the Amazon rainforest? That's right. Brazilian climate tech company Moss.Earth (Moss) released a NFT that allows you to contribute to saving the Amazon. Purchasing one of their NFTs makes you the owner of one hectare of the rainforest, which is roughly the size of one American football field, digitally encrypted, and authenticated on the Ethereum blockchain. Moss, who rigorously audited and evaluated the land sold to ensure customers legally own the land, plans to invest 20% of the NFT sales towards securing the 50-hectare site with patrolling and satellite imagery monitoring to ensure the land hasn't been cleared. Your next investment may not come cheap though. Like many NFT sales, prices have already begun climbing. The original price was $2,052 with re-sale listings ranging from $4,332 to more than $100K. Bottom line, the blockchain can verify your good deed for the day while you update your Twitter profile picture with a hot Amazon rainforest NFT. (Read on EmergingCrypto.io; Read on Ledger Insights) 

P2P payments spurred crypto adoption across Venezuela in 2021

Venezuela, a place with sky rocketing inflation that has made the Bolivar the currency of choice in Hasbro's upcoming Monopoly Venezuela edition (kidding!), is one of the case study countries that has seen peer-to-peer (P2P) payments flourish as local Venezuelans look for outlets to preserve the value of their hard earned Bolivars and to pay for goods and services. According to Chainanalysis, Venezuela ranked seventh in the world in 2021 for overall crypto adoption, primarily due to P2P payments (interestingly, United States was ranked eighth overall). More and more businesses appear to be accepting crypto payments in conjunction with the emergence of crypto payment platforms such as Reserve, Binance Pay, and Valiú. P2P payments aren't isolated to small merchants in the South American oil giant, you can pay with crypto at the Simón Bolívar International Airport, Bios Mercados supermarket chain, approximately 30 casinos, and SimpleTV, the largest TV operator in Venezuela. In addition to its flourishing P2P environment, enthusiasm for mining, play-to-earn gaming, and NFTs has been growing as well. (Read on EmergingCrypto.io; Read on Cointelegraph)

Africa

Image Credit: Gabriel via Unsplash

Sun Exchange Leverages Bitcoin to Complete the Biggest Crowdsourced Project of Any Kind in Africa

Crowdsourcing is a blockchain and crypto use case and South Africa's very own Sun Exchange is using blockchain to crowdsource and lease solar cells to businesses and organizations in emerging markets. Last month Sun Exchange announced that they completed the largest crowdsourced project of any kind in Africa by installing solar panels and generating electricity at the Zimbabwean fresh produce facility, Nhimbe Fresh. Sun Exchanged crowdsourced $1.4 million of solar cells from 1,905 Sun Exchange members across 98 countries. This is how the Sun Exchange model works:

• Sun Exchange finds institutions with viable solar projects;

• Sun Exchange lists a project and members contribute funds, typically in BTC, to buy equipment;

• Contributors lease their equipment to institutions with solar projects earning yield on their investments over a 20 year period.

Aside from supporting projects in emerging markets, Sun Exchange's model presents an opportunity for Bitcoin carbon offsetting and provides an alternative source of energy to businesses and organizations where reliance on the existing power grid may be precarious. (Read on EmergingCrypto.io; Read on BitKE)

Cardano won’t be a part of bringing democratized broadband internet to millions of Africans after all

Cardano, with all it's ambition to be the blockchain of choice in Africa, recently lost out to SKALE and it's relationship with blockchain-based broadband Internet platform 3air due to a shortage Haskell (Cardano programming language) developers available in the market. 3air, the ​​blockchain based platform bringing easy access to high-speed broadband Internet, digital services, identity management, payments, and credit line building to developing countries, also cited scalability issues as a reason to migrate to SKALE. 3air CEO, Sandi Bitenc, explained that moving to SKALE allows 3air to start work immediately and accelerate the project's development timeline. In addition, the SKALE network also offers multichain access to run smart contracts compatible with Ethereum, fast transaction speeds with near zero latency, and zero gas fees. At the end of the day, business is business and Cardano has some work to do to protect its inroads in Africa. (Read on EmergingCrypto.io; Read on CryptoSlate)

Eastern Europe

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Russia Shares Plan To Regulate Bitcoin, Crypto

Last week the Russian government released a report outlining their plan to regulate crypto and integrate it into their financial system. In order to protect the rights and interests of investors and classifying crypto investors as either "qualified" or "non-qualified", the proposed Russian government efforts included licensing exchanges and banks interested in providing Bitcoin services, requiring them to have “liquidity cushions”, and only financial institutions that get a license will have the right to open cryptocurrency-related accounts for individuals. Perhaps the most interesting part was their proposal for a "Transparent Blockchain" that would conduct activities including the monitoring cryptocurrency transactions, creating a database of cryptocurrency wallets, creating mechanisms for monitoring the behavior of participants in the cryptocurrency market in order to identify them, and scanning the Internet and the Darknet to identify wallets associated with suspicious activity for the purposes of anti-money laundering and preventing terrorist financing. Despite what may be seem like a good faith effort to regulate Bitcoin, other cryptocurrencies, and an emerging blockchain and crypto industry, this kind of surveillance may not sit well with many. Nevertheless, these actions by the Russian government may be viewed favorably by more conservative investors and institutions that want to both take part in and influence Russia's emerging crypto economy. (Read on EmergingCrypto.io; Read on Bitcoin Magazine)

Simple math says Russia could collect up to $13B in crypto tax each year

Meanwhile, as the share of global Bitcoin mining in Russia continues to grow, the Russian government estimates that its citizens possess an estimated 12% of global crypto holdings and that it can collect between $1.8 billion (146 billion Rubles) to $13 billion (1 trillion Rubles) in tax revenue by taxing exchanges, intermediaries, over-the-counter (OTC) desks, investments, and income from crypto, Russian publication The Bell reported. And that doesn't include the tax revenue the Russian government can generate from crypto mining. Don't sleep on Russia, readers!

Asia

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China’s Metaverse plans: Decentralization not required

China + Decentralization = Oxymoronic. Therefore, it's no surprise that China's metaverse plans may not be decentralized according to Newzoo's Introduction to the Metaverse Report, referring to China's history of banning cryptocurrencies in 2013, 2017, and 2021. However, that doesn't preclude blockchain and NFTs from having a place in the Sino metaverse. Meanwhile two Chinese giants, Tencent and NetEase, have emerged as the lead providers in this emerging industry. "NetEase built its own official trading platform Treasure House (CBG), where players trade game assets with real currency while NetEase takes a commission…Plus, NetEase is no stranger to blockchain, with several blockchain experiments and even its own currency, "Fuxi Tongbao", which acts as a cross-server asset standard, interoperable across NetEase MMORPGs...Meanwhile, Tencent can achieve its metaverse without decentralized infrastructure…[and] can theoretically achieve high interoperability without [a] decentralized infrastructure because the Tencent ecosystem itself already covers most verticals in the game and tech services industry." (Read on EmergingCrypto.io; Read on Cointelegraph)

Why Singapore is one of the most crypto-friendly countries

Rounding off this week's newsletter is international tax attorney and certified public account, Selva Ozelli, Esq., CPA's opinion piece in Cointelegraph on Singapore's friendly crypto environment. In fact, global crypto rating company, Coincub, ranked Singapore as the most crypto-friendly country in the world given it's forward-thinking regulatory approach to the emerging blockchain industry and crypto economy. In the last year the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) enacted consumer protection laws, established a framework, registration requirements, and AML and Combatting the Financing of Terrorism (CFT) guidelines for payment systems and payment service providers, and published an updated guide on Initial Coin Offerings. In addition, since capital gains on investments are exempted from taxes in Singapore, gains on the sale of crypto aren't taxed either, not bad! Furthermore, the MAS is bullish on the emerging blockchain and crypto industries and have been leaders in the areas of cross border payments, trade finance, and Central Bank Digital Currencies. On top of that, 43% of Singaporeans own cryptocurrency according to the Independent Reserve Cryptocurrency Index (IRCI) [of] Singapore. Needless to say, Singapore may be the place to be a part of the blockchain and crypto future. (Read on EmergingCrypto.io; Read on Cointelegraph)

Thanks for reading and have a great week ahead!