Argentina's Central Market to now witness USDT transactions

By Shashank Bhardwaj| May 23, 2023

Tether and KriptonMarket come together to enable Argentina's Central Market to accept and pay bills with USDT

[CAPTION]Image: Shutterstock[/CAPTION]

Stablecoin issuer Tether has collaborated with on-/off-ramp platform KriptonMarket, which will now enable Argentinians to buy dairy produce with the USDT stablecoin at the Central Market of Buenos Aires. One of Latin America’s largest movers of fruits and vegetables, this partnership will enable the market to use USDT for accepting and paying bills.

They can even use the stablecoin to pay a percentage of employee salaries. As per the city of Buenos Aires, the Central Market employs over 2,000 people and supplies to over 12 million people in a month.

The team at Tether states: “The partnership will also reduce intermediation costs as well as give users a payment option pegged to the United States dollar and is therefore less susceptible to market fluctuations.”

Hyperinflation and the devaluation of Argentina’s fiat currency, Peso, has caused the adoption of crypto to boom in the nation. The Latin American country witnessed April’s inflation rate rising to an all time high of 108.8% YoY. The Argentine Central Bank increased the benchmark interest rate to 97% on May 15, 2023, but despite the use of tight monetary policy, prices have continued to escalate.

“With the continuing devaluation of their nation’s currency, the people of Argentina need solutions to pursue their own financial freedom. If we are able to contribute to the well-being of an entire country through the state-of-the-art technologies provided by the blockchain, we will be one step closer to ending the fight against financial discrimination,” opined Paolo Ardoino, the chief technology officer at Tether.

Daniel Fogg from IOV Labs, the foundation behind smart contract platform Rootstock, said that the adoption of crypto is being led by emerging markets with people wanting to safeguard themselves against macroeconomic shocks.

“For me, if you want to look at the future of what I hope crypto will become, it exists today in Turkey, Colombia, Nigeria, Argentina. It doesn’t exist today in the United States or the U.K.," he noted.

The writer is the founder at yMedia. He ventured into crypto in 2013 and is an ETH maximalist. Twitter: @bhardwajshash