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Jay-Z and Jack Dorsey-Backed Bitcoin Non-Profit ₿trust Appoints Bitcoin Core Developer As Interim CEO

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₿trust, a non-profit focused on training and funding developers from The Global South for Bitcoin open-source development, recently announced Bitcoin Core contributor and one of its board members, Abubakar Nur Khalil, as Interim CEO.

The non-profit was founded in 2021 and received initial funding from Jay-Z and Jack Dorsey. It’s since nurtured an ever-expanding network of Bitcoin developers in Africa, Latin America and India.

₿trust has trained hundreds of developers including some who are working on projects such as Libreria de Satoshi and Bitshala, kickstarted BitDevs meetups across five African cities and supported annual events like the African Bitcoin Conference.

Nur Khalil will serve as Interim CEO for one year, beginning in August 2024. During this period, he’ll retain his board seat and serve as a non-voting member.

This role should be familiar to Nur Khalil, as he founded the organization, which was originally called Qala, before ₿trust acquired and rebranded it.

Other ₿trust board members have expressed faith that Nur Khalil will be an excellent leader for the organization given his expertise as a developer, the fact that he’s a resident of The Global South (Nigeria) and is one of the leading voices in the African Bitcoin ecosystem.

“Ever since I first met him, Abubakar has resolutely focused on supporting the advancement of Bitcoin and open-source development in Africa, the Global South, and beyond,” said founding ₿trust board member and CEO of Fedi Obi Nwosu. “I’m grateful that he has taken on the challenge of leading ₿trust through this early formative stage, and I’m excited to see what he will achieve in the role.”

As Interim CEO, Nur Khalil will focus on growing ₿trust’s developer pipeline, increasing the number of grants the institution distributes and improving its developer program to push forward with its mission of decentralizing Bitcoin open-source development.

“I am truly grateful for the board’s trust in me to take on this role over the next year,” said Nur Khalil. “I look forward to growing our initiatives, ensuring ₿trust cements itself as the primary driving force behind Bitcoin’s development in Africa, and cultivating a unique Bitcoin FOSS ecosystem in the regions we serve.”





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5th Epoch

CORVA: Welcome To The Empowerment Epoch — Bitcoin As The People’s Money

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At this year’s Oslo Freedom Forum, gigabrain Lyn Alden made the case that bitcoin is now liquid enough to be used in a human rights context, a compelling argument and one with which I agree.

Bitcoin, which now has a market cap of over $1.2 trillion, is less volatile than it was a decade ago and can now more readily be used to help empower those who’ve historically been financially disenfranchised. (The larger an asset’s market cap, the less volatile the price of the asset tends to become. When bitcoin had a much lower market cap in its early days, it wasn’t uncommon to see it lose over 80% of its value in crashes. For this reason, it would have been much harder to use it in a human rights context back then.)

Here are some examples of how Bitcoin is currently being used for human rights purposes:

  • Bitcoin Dada educates African women about how to invest in and use Bitcoin. Many women in Africa live in patriarchal societies in which women aren’t permitted to own property. Bitcoin helps them subvert such rules, allowing them to save in the hardest asset ever known to humanity, with few being the wiser.
  • Bitcoin Dua is a Bitcoin circular economy and a community center located in Ghana in which community members not only learn what Bitcoin is and how to use it but also skills that they can use to obtain jobs in which they can earn in bitcoin. This program is particularly relevant in a country in which the traditional currency was the worst-performing currency in the world in 2022 and continues to fall in value versus the US dollar.
  • Lyudmyla Kozlovska, President of the Open Dialogue Foundation, someone who has been debanked by dictators herself, has been making the case to regulators in the United States and Europe that Bitcoin is a money and financial network of last resort for pro-democracy activists living under authoritarian regimes and that the right to use it needs to be protected. She argues that one of the first moves in the playbook of dictators these days is to cut dissidents off from the traditional financial system, leaving said dissidents with Bitcoin as their primary means to transact.

The work that these people, programs and institutions and the many others like them have done during the previous Bitcoin epoch has set the stage for the Empowerment Epoch — Bitcoin’s fifth epoch, the one in which it will become synonymous with the term “human rights.”

That said, this will not come without challenges.

High fees on the Bitcoin base chain will price certain users out of self-custody, pushing them to use Layer 2 solutions like Lightning and extensions of Lightning like ecash, non-traceable versions of sats that can be sent at almost no cost.

Companies like Fedi have developed a super app for the Global South that gives users access to Lightning, ecash and other freedom tech, while Machankura enables residents of various African countries to transact with bitcoin in a custodial manner using feature phones (non-smart phones). (Machankura is also working on turning feature phones into Bitcoin hardware wallets.)

Layer 2 solutions will not be perfect and there will be tradeoffs with each of them. But even considering the imperfections of the technologies that make bitcoin more usable, they still provide many around the world with access to a parallel financial system, serving as a hedge to the existing monetary and financial systems.

As new challenges arise, I have little doubt that organizations like the Human Rights Foundation will continue to bring activists and educators together with developers and entrepreneurs to meet these challenges and to help bring bitcoin — the people’s money — to those who need it most in this, the Empowerment Epoch.

This article is a Take. Opinions expressed are entirely the author’s and do not necessarily reflect those of BTC Inc or Bitcoin Magazine.





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Africa

Stablecoins represent 40% of crypto economy in Sub-Saharan Africa

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As businesses turn to dollar-pegged options, stablecoins now represent over 40% of Sub-Saharan Africa’s crypto economy.

Stablecoins have emerged as a vital component of Sub-Saharan Africa‘s crypto economy, accounting for approximately 43% of the region’s total transaction volume, according to a recent report from Chainalysis.

In nations grappling with volatile local currencies and limited access to U.S. dollars, dollar-pegged stablecoins such as Tether (USDT) and Circle (USDC) have gained prominence, enabling businesses and individuals to store value, facilitate international payments, and bolster cross-border trade.

In a commentary to Chainalysis, Yellow Card chief executive Chris Maurice said that “about 70% of African countries are facing an FX shortage, and businesses are struggling to get access to the dollars they need to operate.”

Chainalysis: Stablecoins represent 40% of crypto economy in Sub-Saharan Africa - 1
Share of Bitcoin vs stablecoins received in Sub-Saharan Africa’s region | Source: Chainalysis

Stablecoins to become primary use case for crypto in South Africa

As a result of this struggle, Ethiopia, Africa’s second-most populous nation, has seen retail-sized stablecoin transfers grow by 180% year-over-year, fueled by a recent 30% devaluation of its local currency, the birr.

While traditional financial institutions struggle to meet the demand for U.S. dollars, stablecoins are increasingly viewed as a “proxy for the dollar,” Maurice said, adding that “if you can get into USDT or USDC, you can easily swap that into hard dollars elsewhere.”

Looking ahead, Rob Downes, head of digital assets at ABSA Bank, a major African bank operating in 12 African countries, foresees stablecoins playing a pivotal role in Africa’s economic landscape, stating that dollar-pegged tokens are going to be the “primary use case for crypto in South Africa over the next three to five years.”



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Bitcoin Non-Profit ₿trust Announces Q3 Grants For Open-Source Developers

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₿trust, an initiative committed to supporting open-source Bitcoin developers based in the Global South, has announced the recipients of its Q3 Starter Grants and the new members of its ₿trust Open-Source Cohort.

The Starter Grants, which provide full-time funding to Bitcoin software engineers, are a sign of ₿trust’s dedication to expanding the number of open-source Bitcoin contributors from regions such as Africa, MENA, Southeast Asia and Latin America.

Each recipient receives six months of support, including a stipend paid in bitcoin, technical guidance and support in developing proposals to to join the ₿trust Open-Source Cohort with long-term funding.

Why ₿trust Starter Grants Matter

₿trust Starter Grants provide financial stability to talented open source developers, which helps them focus on their work without financial stress. They also provide mentorship and support aimed to help the developers establish long-term, sustainable careers in the Bitcoin space.

“Through these grants, we can tangibly contribute to decentralizing Bitcoin open source development by introducing these developers with diverse perspectives to strengthen the resilience of the Bitcoin network,” said ₿trust Interim CEO Abubakar Nur Khalil in a press release shared with Bitcoin Magazine.

The Starter Grants also provide a pathway to the ₿trust Open-Source Cohort. Developers in the ₿trust Open-Source Cohort receive mentorship, professional development and extended financial support while contributing to open-source initiatives.

“The intention is to make grantees’ Bitcoin open-source careers sustainable, and in addition to the long-term financial support we provide, create a supportive environment for them to thrive and feel a larger sense of community,” said Nur Khalil.

Starter Grant Recipients

The recipients of Q3 2024 Starter Grants are as follows:

Enigbe Ochekliye

Ochekliye has over two years of experience in backend engineering and has worked on projects including Galoy’s Stablesats and Easepay’s payment service provider (PSP).

Ochekliye will contribute to The Lightning Development Kit’s rust-lightning through this grant. She will also work to improve the onboarding process for new contributors to Bitcoin open source projects.

Enigbe Ochekliye

Tobechi Chukwuleta

Chukwuleta is a highly-experienced backend developer with a background in data analysis. He has also been instrumental in enhancing BTCPay Server functionality, especially as it pertains to the system’s multisig capabilities and plugin development.

The funds from his Starter Grant will support him as he continues to advance BTCPay Server’s store functionality as well as the platform’s modularity.

Tobechi Chukwuleta

Kelvin Isievwore

Isievwore is currently contributing to Bitcoin open source projects such as Polar and LND. While working under the Starter Grant, Isievwore will focus on streamlining the testing and development process for engineers building on Lightning.

Kelvin Isievwore

New Members Of The Open-Source Cohort

The new members of the ₿trust Open-Source Cohort are as follows:

Abubakar Sadiq Ismail

Sadiq Ismail is a Nigerian Bitcoin Core contributor who is actively involved in optimizing the Bitcoin protocol. He works on critical areas of Bitcoin Core such as long-term fee estimation and transaction analysis.

Sadiq Ismail’s work on Mempool fee estimation analysis showcases his technical abilities, which helps to improve the scalability and usability of Bitcoin. While a part of the cohort, he will continue this work, as he refines his abilities to contribute to the Bitcoin ecosystem.

Abubakar Sadiq Ismail

Duncan Dean

Dean is a Lightning contributor from South Africa. He has been deeply involved with developing the highly-modular Lightning library, rust-lightning.

Dean also actively participates in projects like ldk-review-club and lndk, where he has contributed to improving continuous integration (CI) actions and helped maintain the robustness of the codebase. While in the cohort, Dean aims to strengthen his abilities to contribute to Bitcoin and Lightning.

Duncan Dean

Oghenovo Usiwoma

Usiwoma is a Bitcoin Core contributor based in Nigeria who has been with ₿trust since 2023. Under the ₿trust Starter Grant he focused on advancing Silent Payments functionality.

As part of the ₿trust Open-Source Cohort, he will work on introducing new key formats and descriptors for Silent Payments in Bitcoin Core, continuing his work of enhancing the privacy and scalability features of Bitcoin.

Oghenovo Usiwoma

Applying For A ₿trust Grant

Developers based in Africa, the MENA region, Southeast Asia and Latin America can apply for ₿trust grants.

Developers in other regions of the Global South will also be considered for grants on a case-by-case basis, predominantly based on their proof of work in the Bitcoin space.

Apply for a ₿trust Starter Grant via this ₿trust link.





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