Orionx plans to expand into Mexico, Peru and Colombia by 2024.
Bitfinex partnership pushes crypto adoption in Latin America
Bitfinex announced a new investment in the Chile-based crypto exchange in an effort to boost crypto adoption in Latin America.
Bitfinex And Crypto Bank OrionX Forged Partnership To Broaden Presence In Latin America
A press release shared with Bitcoinist claimed that Bitfinex partnered with crypto bank OrionX. The cooperation will allow the trading venue to strengthen its foothold in the Latin American region by targeting key countries with a high demand for crypto products.
Bitfinex Grows In Latin America, What’s Behind Deal With OrionX?
Based in Chile, OrionX was launched 2017 as a crypto trading platform. In the following years, the company has become a powerhouse in its home country, and it’s looking to expand into Peru, Colombia, and Mexico as it targets one million users by 2024.
In that sense, the cooperation with Bitfinex will allow the crypto bank to use its partner’s expertise as a worldwide platform. OrionX might benefit from Bitfinex’s capabilities with multiple products, such as trading, staking, and crypto lending.
Thus, the Latin American platform is seeking to increase its chances of succeeding in its expansion. In the meantime, Bitfinex seeks to increase its presence in the region.
Cofounder of OrionX Joel Vainstein stated about the partnership:
Having a strategic collaboration with a company like Bitfinex will play a vital role in advancing our project in LATAM. We firmly believe that their involvement will provide a substantial impetus to our capital raising activities. We are confident that their extensive experience and proven product portfolio will expedite our own product development and user base expansion, positioning us as the benchmark in the region.
Since 2021, the crypto trading venue has doubled its efforts to work with Latin American projects. Per the release, the company partnered with several organizations to promote Bitcoin and decentralized technologies, such as “Mi Primer Bitcoin,” based in El Salvador.
In addition, the crypto trading venue has been promoting financial and scientific education via its contribution to a Paraguay-based NGO called Penguin Academy. Bitfinex sponsored a three-week boot camp focused on teaching women coding skills.
The cooperation with OrionX is taking these efforts to the next level. The partners recognize the region’s need for financial products and services and are preparing to offer an alternative to the legacy financial system.
According to Paolo Ardoino, CTO at Bitfinex:
We’re excited to collaborate with Orionx as we look to expand our presence in Chile and across Latin America. This represents a major step forward in our efforts to harness the power of Bitcoin and decentralised technology to promote financial freedom and empower businesses that share our values. We look forward to working even more closely with the team at Orionx to support its growth and development going forward.
Latin America is one of the fasting regions adopting cryptocurrencies and digital assets. This metric has been expanding by 40% year-on-year, per data from Chainalysis.
In countries like Venezuela and Argentina, crypto is a lifeline for people looking to send and receive money from their families abroad, an investment vehicle to shield from hyperinflation, and a medium of exchange more effective than their local currencies.
Cover image from Unsplash, chart from Tradingview
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Bitcoin Pound Sterling Volume Soars To ATH Amid Currency Crisis
The pound sterling is experiencing heavy turbulence. The dollar is eating it all. Bitcoin is in a deep slumber. What a time to be alive! Things are moving and shaking in the finance world and the general population can’t do much but watch the show. And place their bets. British people recently saw the pound sterling and the euro sink to all-time lows against the dollar. A percentage of the population reacted by acquiring bitcoin, the charts show.
Another important factor is that the pound sterling’s “volatility last week was highly unusual, creating opportunities and price discrepancies.” The currency crisis created potential possibilities, and British traders seem to have taken advantage of them. As a reminder, the pound sterling saw “a feisty week in the UK pending proposed and later abandoned tax cuts.” This is all according to Arcane Research’s The Weekly Update.
In Bitcoinist’s first report on the situation, our sister site said:
“The UK’s interest in Bitcoin (BTC) will expand “quite quickly” as fiat currency instability makes the flagship digital currency asset resemble a stablecoin, analysts said.
As one of several this week to highlight BTC’s attractiveness over the pound sterling, strategy adviser at financial firm VanEck Gabor Gurbacs came to that decision.
“Because of the instability of the pound,” Gurbacs warned, “the United Kingdom will get orange-pilled very rapidly.”
The last factor to analyze is this one, “most of the growth was concentrated in spiking volumes on Bitfinex.” Why was that? Keep reading to find out.
By The Numbers: The Pound Sterling ’s Busy Week
The headline is this one: the BTCGBP trading volume’s 7-day average reached an all-time high this week. Also, surprising no one, “similar tendencies occurred in ETHGBP.” How high was the all-time high, though? Back to The Weekly Update, “BTCGBP pairs saw trading volumes climbing above 47,000 BTC last Monday, after having experienced growth throughout the latter parts of September.”
BTCGBP Trading Volume (7d Moving Average) | Source: The Weekly Update
As for the reason for the pound sterling to bitcoin movements, Arcane Research’s analysts blame it on “market maker rebalancing.” Although they also recognize that bitcoin is “gaining mind share amidst declining trust in the British Pound.”
A similar thing happened to the Russian ruble at the beginning of the conflict with Ukraine. At the time, our sister site Bitcoinist reported:
“The new all-time high on the BTCRUB pair is the result of the Russian ruble falling more than 50% against the United States dollar since the start of the year. As the global reserve currency, most financial assets are priced in USD.”
Will the pound sterling rebound as fast as the ruble did? Or will the dollar continue to dominate for the foreseeable future?
BTC price chart for 10/05/2022 on Gemini | Source: BTC/GBP on TradingView.com
Why Was Most Of The Growth On Bitfinex?
The analysts at Arcane Research identified another fascinating factor. An incentive, if you will. They named it a “prolonged structural mispricing” and it refers to a “dollar-adjusted premium or discount in Bitfinex’s BTCGBP pair last week.” All you have to do is adjust “the BTCGBP pair to USD,” to see that the pound sterling / bitcoin pair “traded at a significant discount to dollar spot.” This was an effect and not a cause. The market movements created this arbitrage opportunity. People who detected the incentive on time, profited.
“As the GBP bottomed vs. the USD, BTCGBP traded at a massive discount compared to BTCUSD. The discount turned into a prolonged premium with certain wicks deep into discount terrains as GBP traded in a highly volatile environment.”
Despite the significance of this factor, Arcane Research still believes that “the predominant force was market makers reducing their exposure” to the pound sterling.
Featured Image by Ewan Kennedy on Unsplash | Charts by TradingView and The Weekly Update
