Ukraine’s official Twitter account has posted a call for donations in cryptocurrencies, including Bitcoin, Ethereum and the dollar-pegged cryptocurrency Tether.
The Deputy Prime Minister of Ukraine, Mikhailo Fedorov, confirmed through his Twitter account that the call for donations was genuine, and asked people to stand with Ukraine.
As of publication, the Ukrainian government and NGOs providing support to the military have raised $13.7 million through thousands of cryptocurrency donations since the start of the invasion.
One NGO received a single donation of 80 bitcoins worth $3 million, according to research firm Elliptic.
Decentralized Autonomous Organizations (DAOs) were formed to support Ukrainians. The NFT was sold to raise funds for the Ukrainian people and army.
Such donations are usually made through banks. But cryptocurrencies have emerged in Ukraine as a quick and easy way to deal with this money.
“You don’t trust the local currency and on top of that, you don’t trust the banks,” said Ilya Polosukhin, the Ukrainian partner of NEAR protocol, an Ethereum competitor. This makes Ukraine a natural place for the adoption of cryptocurrency.
Ukraine is famous for its technical talents with more than 200,000 technical workers. And the volume of its business in the export of information technology reached 6.8 billion dollars last year.
It also formally legalized cryptocurrencies last year with a law regulating digital financial assets.
Ukraine asked for cryptocurrency donations to fight Russia
The country ranked fourth in Chainalysis’ global cryptocurrency adoption index, after Vietnam, India and Pakistan. About $8 billion of cryptocurrency passes through the country annually.
The international crypto community has responded extensively to messages of support for Ukraine. Vitalik Buterin, the creator of Ethereum, tweeted that the invasion was a crime against the Ukrainian and Russian people.
Later, Buterin retweeted an announcement from Unchain.fund aimed at humanitarian relief. A member of the Russian performance art group Pussy Riot created UkraineDAO to use the power of web3 technology and the community to raise funds.
There is also RELI3F, a humanitarian aid initiative founded by NFT/web3 artists who collaborate to support the people of Ukraine. The CEO of the FTX platform announced via Twitter that the company gave $25 to each Ukrainian citizen via FTX.
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