When the world gets closer.

We help you see farther.

Sign up to our expressly international daily newsletter.

Already a subscriber? Log in.

You've reach your limit of free articles.

Get unlimited access to Worldcrunch

You can cancel anytime.

SUBSCRIBERS BENEFITS

Ad-free experience NEW

Exclusive international news coverage

Access to Worldcrunch archives

Monthly Access

30-day free trial, then $2.90 per month.

Annual Access BEST VALUE

$19.90 per year, save $14.90 compared to monthly billing.save $14.90.

Subscribe to Worldcrunch
Argentina

From Facebook To Finance, The Blockchain Era Is Now

Expect use of blockchain, the digital record-keeping system, to become generalized this year in banks and elsewhere.

Blockchained
Blockchained
Leo Elduayen*

-Analysis-

BUENOS AIRES — Last year was a decisive one for blockchain and the cryptographic space in the world. We saw the birth of new alliances and the first interbank blockchain transactions. Bitcoin and Ethereum survived a bear market. And Facebook launched Libra in hopes of recovering this year from its 2019 setbacks.

In the depths of the ocean of the chain of blocks, there are landmarks like the first cross-frontier payments between the central banks of Canada and Singapore, registered in 2019, and China's initiation in billions of U.S. dollars' worth of investment in crypto-innovations. We know that this year China will launch its central bank for digital money.

By nature the industry most inclined to adopt blockchain is finance, as the technology is essentially based on the transactional model. This sector needs to start functioning digitally in a secure, confidential and transparent manner. Blockchain assures this as security and transparency are integral to its very nature.

In Argentina, conditions are set for the financial sector to briskly advance toward adopting the blockchain infrastructure, as its best technological response to a need to make operations more cost-effective, and ultimately for inclusion. Notably, Argentina has already included blockchain on the national innovation table, and the first interbank transactions involving the technology took place in 2019.

This solution allows citizens to be given points for paying taxes on time, recycling, or using municipal bicycles.

Beyond finances, blockchain can potentially add value to asymmetrical information situations or where there is insufficient trust. Examples of its applicability include traceability industries, digital signatures between parties and certification procedures. These are all processes where an unchangeable register of transactions is of particular importance, especially when particular payments need to be found. The ability to program smart contracts inside transaction flows is for many organizations a tool to optimize their operations, while for entities like NGOs, its value is in bringing transparency.

Last year also gave us the the first cryptocurrency wallet of digital assets for the district of Marcos Paz in the Buenos Aires province. This solution allows citizens to be given points for paying taxes on time, recycling, attending pet sterilization events or using municipal bicycles, among other civic actions. People can the spend those points on products in shops registered with the program, or else use them as tax credits.

The tokenization of juridical processes is also close. This will allow faster and more efficient administration of normative frameworks through networks connecting smart contracts, archives storage, messaging, payment channels, lateral chains, oracles and more. The year 2020 will see a considerable number of essential infrastructure elements.



*The author is a co-founder of Koibanx, a blockchain development firm.

You've reached your limit of free articles.

To read the full story, start your free trial today.

Get unlimited access. Cancel anytime.

Exclusive coverage from the world's top sources, in English for the first time.

Insights from the widest range of perspectives, languages and countries.

Geopolitics

Senegal's Democratic Unrest And The Ghosts Of French Colonialism

The violence that erupted following the sentencing of opposition politician Ousmane Sonko to two years in prison left 16 people dead and 500 arrested. This reveals deep fractures in Senegalese democracy that has traces to France's colonial past.

Image of Senegalese ​Protesters celebrating Sonko being set free by the court, March 2021

Protesters celebrate Sonko being set free by the court, March 2021

Pierre Haski

-Analysis-

PARIS — For a long time, Senegal had the glowing image of one of Africa's rare democracies. The reality was more complicated than that, even in the days of the poet-president Léopold Sedar Senghor, who also had his dark side.

But for years, the country has been moving down what Senegalese intellectual Felwine Sarr describes as the "gentle slope of... the weakening and corrosion of the gains of Senegalese democracy."

This has been demonstrated once again over the last few days, with a wave of violence that has left 16 people dead, 500 arrested, the internet censored, and a tense situation with troubling consequences. The trigger? The sentencing last Thursday of opposition politician Ousmane Sonko to two years in prison, which could exclude him from the 2024 presidential elections.

Young people took to the streets when the verdict was announced, accusing the justice system of having become a political tool. Ousmane Sonko had been accused of rape but was convicted of "corruption of youth," a change that rendered the decision incomprehensible.

Keep reading...Show less

You've reached your limit of free articles.

To read the full story, start your free trial today.

Get unlimited access. Cancel anytime.

Exclusive coverage from the world's top sources, in English for the first time.

Insights from the widest range of perspectives, languages and countries.

Already a subscriber? Log in.

You've reach your limit of free articles.

Get unlimited access to Worldcrunch

You can cancel anytime.

SUBSCRIBERS BENEFITS

Ad-free experience NEW

Exclusive international news coverage

Access to Worldcrunch archives

Monthly Access

30-day free trial, then $2.90 per month.

Annual Access BEST VALUE

$19.90 per year, save $14.90 compared to monthly billing.save $14.90.

Subscribe to Worldcrunch

The latest