🌎 [Analysis] The petro is real and Venezuelans are slowly starting to trade it - Jose Antonio Lanz

State sanctioned and black market trading of Venezuela's cryptocurrency, the Petro, is slowing rolling out, particularly for hungry speculators. One state sanctioned exchange, Amberes, launched a PTR/$BTC trading pair two weeks ago and has had continuously increasing trade volume with 300 Petros bought through the exchange since launch. While the Petro trades far under the government peg at about 0.0059 BTC or $30 per coin, Venezuelans can use them for inter-bank settlement or trading for other currencies like USD, Bitcoin, or Litecoin ($LTC). According to Decrypt, the Petro has yet to be used in a meaningful way by the government, but investors are speculating that it might find a use case. Informal Telegram group chats are also on the rise, coordinating trades publically with administrators sometimes acting as an escrow service.