The president of Venezuela, Nicolas Maduro, is unveiling a “youth bank” which sources indicate will be financed using the controversial petro cryptocurrency of the state. The president made his speech on Thursday in a youth ceremony that was conducted in the state of Aragua, which like the rest of the country is suffering the ravages of economic implosion and hyperinflation.

The president’s commitment

Maduro disclosed that as a government they were going to do all within their means to see to it that the new institution was up and running in the shortest time possible. He got more specific to outline that the close to $1.2 billion-worth of the cryptocurrency was going to be channeled in the undertaking adding that the objective of the bank remained to be that of supporting “productive initiatives.”

The other thing that stood out from Maduro‘s speech was his assertion that every university needed to establish a mining farm to produce cryptocurrencies in a bid to strengthen the Venezuelan economy. How this would strengthen the Venezuelan economy remains uncertain.

It was back in February that the national oil-backed cryptocurrency was unveiled and that was after a direct order issued out by the president. Much criticism has popped up with many taking the stand that it is a strategy geared towards evasion of the U.S-led sanctions against Venezuela.

Latest criticism and recent developments

It is also important to state that the Venezuelan opposition-led congress has come out strongly to condemn the petro cryptocurrency terming it “illegal”. It is a topic that is generating heated discussions among the concerned parties.

It was recently in an interview when a top official working with the government spoke in relation to the latest developments. He revealed that Venezuela had established a crypto mining program and that president Maduro had exuded confidence on its capacity to attract about 1 million people ranging from the university students, the homeless, single mothers and the unemployed.

Uncertainty continues to engulf the point that “petro gold” which Maduro referred to in his speech will be financed using gold or not. In his long speech, the president was not able to come out quite clearly in terms of expounding this point. Most of the people were left confused on whether he was referring to the naturally-occurring goldmines or the central bank’s gold reserves.