As the conflict in Ukraine entered its third week, Twitter has proven to be a helpful source of information as well as a valuable fundraising mechanism for humanitarian and defensive efforts.Ukraine’s government began collecting Bitcoin, Ethereum, and Tether donations via Twitter, a crowdfunding campaign that has so far raised well over $50 million.
Ukraine Vice Prime Minister Mykhailo Federov tweeted on Wednesday that “Dogecoin has surpassed the value of the Russian currency” and that “now even meme [sic] can finance our troops.”
Ukraine’s official Twitter feed had earlier that day offered an “airdrop” for all individuals who have contributed crypto to the opposition. On Wednesday, a photograph was to be taken, presumably to record all of the addresses that had donated donations, but details were sparse.
Federov announced the cancellation of the airdrop on Thursday, adding, “Instead, we will announce NFTs to reinforce Ukrainian Armed Forces soon.” “We have no intention of issuing any fungible tokens.”
“This is the best rug ever,” crypto podcaster Cobie tweeted, referring to a “rug pull,” which is a sort of exit scam in which a corporation solicits donations from the public only to vanish without fulfilling commitments (usually a token drop).
Federov hasn’t yet revealed any details as to what kind of NFTs Ukraine’s government will be distributed, but one DAO has already beaten them to the punch.
Last week, a group of activists, including Nadya Tolokonnikova, the founder of the Russian protest punk band Pussy Riot, formed a DAO to support NGOs assisting civilians during the war. The auction of an NFT of Ukraine’s flag was one of Ukraine DAO’s initial activities. The auction closed on Wednesday with a total of 2,250 ETH ($6.75 million) raised.
The question of whether Russian oligarchs may utilize crypto to escape sanctions is one component of the crypto discussion surrounding the Russia-Ukraine conflict. Last Sunday, Ukraine’s Federov demanded that all crypto exchanges block Russian users, a demand that former US presidential candidate Hillary Clinton backed wholeheartedly, but Binance and Kraken both declined right away.
It took a little longer for Coinbase to respond. Because blockchains are public ledgers and thus fully traceable, CEO Brian Armstrong posted a nine-tweet thread detailing why he didn’t think Russia could utilize crypto in any meaningful way to avoid sanctions.
“Some ordinary Russians are embracing crypto as a lifeline now that their currency has collapsed,” Armstrong wrote, declining to block Russian users. Many of them are likely to be opposed to what their country is doing, and a ban would be detrimental to them as well.”
Sanctions
Iranian NFT fans discovered they had been barred from OpenSea when they awoke on Thursday. “Woke up to my @opensea trading account being deactivated/deleted without notice or any explanation,” local NFT creator @Bornosor tweeted. “Hearing lots of similar reports from other Iranian artists & collectors.” What exactly is going on here? Is OS now removing people based on their country of origin?”
The ban was imposed as a result of Iran’s inclusion on the US sanctions list.