{"id":19240,"date":"2026-01-06T00:47:55","date_gmt":"2026-01-06T00:47:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/bitunikey.com\/news\/post-maduro-venezuela-may-lean-on-bitcoin-as-leader-machado-emerges\/"},"modified":"2026-01-06T00:48:04","modified_gmt":"2026-01-06T00:48:04","slug":"post-maduro-venezuela-may-lean-on-bitcoin-as-leader-machado-emerges","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bitunikey.com\/news\/post-maduro-venezuela-may-lean-on-bitcoin-as-leader-machado-emerges\/","title":{"rendered":"Post-Maduro Venezuela may lean on Bitcoin as leader Machado emerges"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><\/p>\n<div class=\"post-detail__content blocks\">\n<p class=\"is-style-lead\">Bitcoin once helped Venezuelans survive hyperinflation\u2014and opposition leader Mar\u00eda Corina Machado is hopeful that it one day could help rebuild the country\u2019s economy.<\/p>\n<div id=\"cn-block-summary-block_538eab5c77710af102ea685177c98621\" class=\"cn-block-summary\">\n<div class=\"cn-block-summary__nav tabs\">\n        <span class=\"tabs__item is-selected\">Summary<\/span>\n    <\/div>\n<div class=\"cn-block-summary__content\">\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Machado once pointed to Bitcoin as both a hedge against state mismanagement and a potential pillar of national recovery.<\/li>\n<li>Venezuela\u2019s opposition leader argues that digital assets offered ordinary citizens a rare escape from inflation, capital controls and financial censorship under successive authoritarian governments.<\/li>\n<li>Prediction markets such as Kalshi place Machado\u2019s odds of leading Venezuela by the end of 2026 at roughly 27%.<\/li>\n<\/ul><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p><!-- .cn-block-summary --><\/p>\n<p>Machado has repeatedly cited Bitcoin\u2019s role in helping Venezuelans protect their savings as the bol\u00edvar collapsed, losing 14 zeros since 1999. In 2024, she described Bitcoin as a \u201clifeline\u201d that allowed citizens to bypass government-controlled exchange rates and preserve\u2014sometimes even recover\u2014their wealth amid economic freefall.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe envision Bitcoin as part of our national reserves, helping rebuild what the dictatorship stole,\u201d Machado said at the time.<\/p>\n<p>Her comments came as Venezuela faced renewed turmoil following the disputed July 2024 presidential election. <\/p>\n<p>Today, Venezuela\u2019s economy is in more profound disarray. Nicol\u00e1s Maduro, who claimed a third consecutive term in 2024 even though his opposition, Edmundo Gonz\u00e1lez, won by a landslide, has been arrested due to a U.S. military operation. <\/p>\n<p>Maduro\u2019s vice president and oil minister, Delcy Rodriguez, was formally sworn in on Monday, January 5, as the country\u2019s interim president. Still, President Donald Trump <a rel=\"nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.cbsnews.com\/live-updates\/venezuela-us-military-strikes-maduro-trump\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\">insists<\/a> that the U.S. is \u201cin charge\u201d of Venezuela following the capture of Maduro.<\/p>\n<p>    <!-- .cn-block-related-link --><\/p>\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">While Maduro was in power\u2026<\/h2>\n<p>Venezuela has been suffering from a devastating economic squeeze \u2014 intensified by a government that restricted access to major crypto platforms, including Binance. Caracas also abandoned its state-backed cryptocurrency, the Petro, after years of scandals and operational failures.<\/p>\n<p>Bitcoin and other crypto assets increasingly filled the gap. Machado\u2019s fellow opposition figure. Leopoldo L\u00f3pez, said in 2023 that crypto\u2014particularly stablecoins\u2014helped bypass banking controls and volatility, noting that digital assets were used to distribute aid to roughly 65,000 healthcare workers during the pandemic.<\/p>\n<p>With Maduro reportedly captured by U.S. forces on Jan. 3, 2026, and prediction markets such as Kalshi <a rel=\"nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/bitbo.io\/news\/machado-bitcoin-venezuela-odds\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\">placing<\/a> Machado\u2019s odds of leading Venezuela by the end of 2026 at roughly 27%, analysts say crypto could again feature prominently in the country\u2019s recovery debate.<\/p>\n<p>However, Machado was blocked from running in Venezuela\u2019s 2024 presidential election after the country\u2019s Supreme Tribunal of Justice upheld a 15-year political ban against her. The Maduro government justified the disqualification by accusing Machado of administrative violations and supporting international sanctions against the regime\u2014claims she has denied as politically motivated. <\/p>\n<p>The Organization of American States, the European Union and Human Rights Watch condemned the move as an effort to sideline the leading opposition candidate and undermine a free and fair election.<\/p>\n<p>With Maduro now in a New York City prison for an alleged narco-terrorism conspiracy, it remains to be seen whether the ban against Machado will remain in place.<\/p>\n<p>    <!-- .cn-block-related-link --><\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Bitcoin once helped Venezuelans survive hyperinflation\u2014and opposition leader Mar\u00eda Corina Machado is hopeful that it one day could help rebuild the country\u2019s economy. Summary Machado once pointed to Bitcoin as&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":19241,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-19240","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-cryptocurrency"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bitunikey.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19240","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bitunikey.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bitunikey.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bitunikey.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bitunikey.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=19240"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/bitunikey.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19240\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":19242,"href":"https:\/\/bitunikey.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19240\/revisions\/19242"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bitunikey.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/19241"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bitunikey.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=19240"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bitunikey.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=19240"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bitunikey.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=19240"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}