Venezuela suffers from hyperinflationand the president recently devalued the country's currency by 95%.

The local population is turning to cryptocurrencies as a more stable store of value and a means to conduct transactions.

Every month, 200 traders sign up to accept a cryptocurrency called dash in Venezuela, according to Dash Core Group, and the adoption rate is accelerating.

A cryptocurrency called dash is seeing a surge of new merchant registrations and wallet downloads in Venezuela as hyperinflation in the country goes wild.

It is predicted that Venezuela to see inflation of up to 1,000,000,000 percent this yearThe local population will need lots and lots of money just to buy foodstuffs. Socialist President Nicolás Maduro announced in August a series of measures aimed at stabilizing the economy, among them the devaluation of the bolivar by 95% and its linkage to the state cryptocurrency, the ?petro?

However, dasha cryptocurrency not backed by the state, seems to be gaining ground.

?We are seeing tens of thousands of wallet downloads from the country every month,? Ryan Taylor, chief executive officer of Dash Core Group, told Business Insider. Earlier this year, Venezuela became our second largest market, even ahead of China and Russia, which are, of course, huge in cryptocurrencies at the moment.

The BBC recently reported that Venezuela had become "a paralyzed country" after the economic changes last August. Cash withdrawals are being restricted, and there is confusion over exactly how the new system works.

Venezuelans are turning to cryptocurrencies as a way to store value as the bolivar's exchange rate spirals out of control.

Dash, an open source cryptocurrency created in 2014, has low rates and near-instantaneous transactions. It is now the 14th largest cryptocurrency in the world, according to CoinMarketCap.com, with a value of just over $1 billion in circulation.

The Dash Core Group is owned by the payment network on which dash runs. The organization provides services to the network, and its funding comes from mining fees generated by the network.

Taylor said that along with more wallet downloads, which consumers need to store and spend, cryptocurrency was seeing strong adoption among merchants.

It took them a long time to get the first 50, first 100 (retailers)," Taylor, who is based in Arizona, told Business Insider. ?But at the beginning of July, the number was around 400, and we are now at 800.. We are at this point enrolling more than 200 per month?

Brands such as Subway y Calvin Klein have signed up to accept dash in Venezuela, Taylor said.

In fact, even if I accept a credit card, three days later, when the funds arrive in my account, their value in Venezuela is significantly lower than when the authorization was made," he told Business Insider. This is a problem that cryptocurrency can solve. Our instant transactions can solve it, and the relative stability of our cryptocurrency is better than that of your fiat currency?

In response to emailed questions, Taylor said. adoption in Venezuela has accelerated even further after Maduro's latest economic plans were announced.

?We have seen 94 new Venezuelan merchants added to DiscoverDash.com since last week, which is nearly double the normal rate of about 50 merchants per week over the past two months,? Taylor said in late August, referring to the website that lists local businesses around the world that accept dash.

We have seen enrollment accelerate from merchants who accepted quickly throughout the crisis," he added. I think that trend will continue.

Why Dash?

Dash's characteristics make it suitable for acting. as a substitute for cash or debit cards. Dash transaction fees are expressed in cents rather than dollars, as Dash transaction fees are known to be. bitcoin. Confirmation times are also represented in seconds, as opposed to slower payment processing times for other cryptocurrencies.

But perhaps the most important reason why dash has caught on in Venezuela is that the Dash network can finance projects on the ground.

Most cryptocurrencies do not have a sustainable source of funding to develop or market themselves. Dash, on the other hand, has a network of stakeholders who vote each month on how to spend the funds generated by the coin's underlying code.

Dash generates new cryptocurrencies when transactions are confirmed on the network. Most of the new cryptocurrency is paid to people who confirm transactions, incentivizing them to do that work. But about 10% goes into a "treasury," a pool of money. that the Dash network allocates to projects and ideas that seek to support and encourage the adoption of dash(The Dash Core Group is in fact financed by this fund).

?Many community members came forward with proposals to do education, hold workshops, open an office where users can come in and sit in a small group and get help setting up a wallet," Taylor said.