‘Before Bitcoin, my most successful investment was shorting the Bolivar’ — Ledn co-founder

Before discovering Bitcoin (BTC), Ledn co-founder Mauricio di Bartolomeo recovered occurrence shorting the Venezuelan Bolivar arsenic it rapidly mislaid worth against the stronger US dollar. Now, with the US dollar depreciating against Bitcoin, borrowing against Bitcoin alternatively of selling it has go a much viable strategy.

“Prior to Bitcoin, my astir palmy concern was shorting the Bolivar with dollars,” di Bartolomeo told Cointelegraph successful an exclusive interrogation astatine the Consensus league successful Toronto, Canada. 

“I was borrowing Bolivars and buying dollars with them, holding the hard dollars and having a get [position] connected the weaker currency,” helium said.

The accomplishment of Bitcoin-backed loans means investors tin present efficaciously instrumentality the aforesaid strategy by utilizing a harder currency arsenic collateral. 

Ledn co-founder Mauricio di Bartolomeo, right, and Cointelegraph’s Sam Bourgi astatine Consensus. Source: Cointelegraph

This was portion of the motivation down launching Ledn, a Cayman Islands-based institution that gives Bitcoin holders the quality to entree dollar liquidity without having to merchantability their BTC. 

By borrowing against Bitcoin, “you’re fundamentally doing the aforesaid thing, but you are successful effect holding the hard money, which is Bitcoin, and taking a get [position] connected dollars, which is simply a weaker currency,” said di Bartolomeo, adding:

“This creates a spot of a virtuous rhythm that we spot hap clip and again with existent estate, with borrowing against your stock, borrowing against your gold, and truthful Bitcoin is nary different.”

Related: Bitcoin miners should wage costs successful depreciating currency — Ledn exec

Crypto lending marketplace connected the rise

Ledn operates successful a overmuch broader crypto lending manufacture that has grown implicit the past 5 years owed to the accelerated appreciation of Bitcoin, the accomplishment of organization investors and the increasing inferior of stablecoins.

By the 4th fourth of 2024, the crypto lending market was valued astatine $30.2 billion, a much than threefold summation compared to 2 years earlier, according to Galaxy Research. However, the size of the wide manufacture remains beneath the 2021 peak. 

The researchers attributed the caller emergence to decentralized concern applications, which let users to get against assets onchain. This inclination was further corroborated by a caller Cointelegraph report, which documented the increasing monetary worth secured by DeFi lending protocols. 

The crypto lending marketplace has rebounded sharply from its 2022 lows but remains good beneath the highest from 2021. Source: Galaxy Research

Ledn was ranked among the apical 3 centralized concern (CeFi) lenders, with a indebtedness publication valued astatine $9.9 cardinal astatine the extremity of 2024. Together, the apical 3 CeFi lenders — Ledn, Tether and Galaxy — relationship for 89% of the full market, the Galaxy study showed.

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