The cost of Bitcoin on Turkish peer-to-peer exchanges has rocketed to $100,000, which is virtually double its present rate on global exchanges. This development comes due to the intensified interest of Turkish citizens in Bitcoin because of the collapse of the local currency – the Turkish lira.
As reported by LocalBitcoins, the lowest price for Bitcoin on local P2P platforms is 508,940 Turkish liras (around $64,000), while on some offline websites the Bitcoin price reached $100,000. This movement took place when the national currency of Turkey tumbled by 14% after President Recep Erdogan sacked Naci Agbal – the head of the Central Bank of Turkey.
Shifting the Paradigm
Agbal was an advocate of raising interest rates as a means to fight the growing inflation in the country. During the short time of his tenure, Agbal was able to adjust the country’s chaotic monetary policy and pull out the Turkish lira away from the bear market. Analysts and strategists think that the sacking of Agbal will once again increase the risks of a decline in Turkey’s state currency and persuade citizens to become active players on the crypto market.
Given the recent developments, Turkish people are indeed forced by the circumstances to shift their attention to Bitcoin. A lot of people perceive BTC as a leverage against inflation and unpredicted changes in economic policies. As observed on Google Trends, after the reports of the Turkish lira plunging appeared, the number of searches for the keyword “Bitcoin” in Turkey increased by 567% in the span of hours. In comparison, this is practically double the number of searches from Bitcoin’s bull rallies in 2017 and 2018.
The Vision of the Government
It is worth noting that it is not just ordinary people in Turkey who have started to conceive cryptocurrencies in a new manner. Earlier in March, Turkey’s Ministry of Finance, in cooperation with the country’s central bank, initiated the development of concrete guidelines for the usage of virtual assets. The Turkish government thinks that the new directives should be designed not only at safeguarding investors but also at the strong development of the crypto industry in the country.
Previously, Agbal stated that this year the Bank of Turkey intends to launch testing of its own digital currency. However, it remains unknown how soon this plan will be executed after his dismissal.
