It may sound like a marketing gimmick, but the founders of the first LGBT+ cryptocurrency said they wanted to harness the economic power of the community with the aim of “changing the world.” A play on words taken from a homophobic slur in Spanish, Maricoin was launched on Friday in a one-week pilot trial involving 10 businesses in Chueca, which has been designated as the LGBT+ neighborhood of the Spanish capital Madrid. Known in
Maricoin proponents are aiming to begin trading the virtual currency early next year, allowing it to be used as a means of payment at LGBT-friendly businesses and events around the world.
“As we move this economy, why shouldn’t our community benefit from it rather than banks, insurance companies or large corporations that often don’t help LGBT+ people?” Co-founder Juan Belmonte, 48, told the Thomson Reuters Foundation over the phone.
Belmonte, a hairdresser and entrepreneur, has LGBT+ . said about the idea of cryptocurrency Came to him while partying with friends at Madrid’s Pride event in July this year.
But he traces the project’s origins back to 2017, when the ultra-conservative group Hezteoire launched a campaign against transgender rights by sending a bus around Spain: “Boys have penises, girls have cunts. Don’t be a fool.”
The conservative Christian group’s campaign was swiftly banned by Spanish authorities, but Belmonte said it made him realize he had to “do something” to help him take advantage of the economic clout of the LGBT+ community in the fight against homosexuality. Was”.
huge market
The global LGBT+ market is huge, with research from Swiss bank Credit Suisse showing that it would rank as the world’s fourth-largest economy after Japan, but ahead of Germany in terms of purchasing power.
A 2018 study by Kantar Consulting and LGBT+ social network Hornet estimated that the purchasing power of the community in the United States alone was $1 trillion (about Rs 74,51,400 crore) in 2016 – roughly African-American or Hispanic consumers.
Maricoin is backed by Miami-based venture capital firm Borderless Capital, and the initiative’s chief executive Francisco Alvarez said that 8,000 people were already on waiting lists and seeking to buy Maricoin before the currency began trading.
Under their plans, LGBT+ cryptocurrencies will be accepted as payment in businesses – from restaurants and cafes to shops and hotels – that have signed the “Declaration of Equality”.
Among other things, the manifesto defends the rights of LGBT+ people and “all people who are subject to exclusion”, as well as advocating for a “social, ethical, transversal and transparent economy”.
“The establishments that accept our coin will be listed on our map, which will serve as an LGBTI guide for anyone visiting any city in the world,” said Alvarez, 48.
“If they violate any point of our anti-discrimination manifesto, for example if they fire a pregnant woman because of her pregnancy, they will be expelled from Maricoin,” he said.
The currency will also have its own LGBT-related language – transfers between Maricoin users are referred to as “trans”.
Alvarez and Belmonte also hope that the venture can generate a source of funding for LGBT+ businesses and community initiatives around the world.
“We will be able to give people microcredit to set up a small LGBTI-friendly cafe in Colombia, or to support projects that help queer refugees fleeing countries where they will be put to death, ” They said.
“We’re hoping to change the world.”
© Thomson Reuters 2021
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