February marks Black Historical past Month – a time to commemorate and study concerning the Black group, heritage, and tradition. This yr, the theme for Black Historical past Month is Black Resistance, honoring and recognizing the resistance to Black Individuals’ historic and ongoing oppression and acknowledging such actions as Black Lives Matter to handle systemic racism.

In honor of Black Historical past Month and in step with this yr’s theme, CoinStats is overlaying the Black Resistance to Black financial disempowerment and the synergy between black economics and blockchain know-how.   

Gerald Ford  was the primary president to formally acknowledge Black Historical past Month in 1976, calling upon the general public to “seize the chance to honor the too-often uncared for accomplishments of Black Individuals in each space of endeavor all through our historical past.”

Since then, we’ve been utilizing this chance to have a good time iconic Black figures who obtain excellence, create change, and educate us concerning the significance of coming collectively to battle racism. From civil rights leaders like Martin Luther King, Jr., and Malcolm X to authors like Ralph Ellison and Maya Angelou to artists comparable to Louis Armstrong and Duke Ellington, and lots of extra Black individuals made excellent contributions to our society, advancing civil rights, tradition, science, sports activities, and so on. 

As we commemorate one other Black Historical past Month, it’s an excellent time to find out how Black Resistance advantages from blockchain know-how and cryptocurrencies and browse up on Black historical past trailblazing icons who’ve helped drive cryptocurrency mainstream adoption to make the world a extra inclusive, accessible, and progressive place.

Overview of Black Individuals’s Involvement within the Cryptocurrency Trade

The outcomes from the survey, carried out by Grayscale in partnership with The Harris Ballot, present that Black Individuals (31%) usually tend to personal crypto than white Individuals (16%). Cryptocurrency boasts monetary inclusion and is touted as a device for equality, transparency, and equity. So can it assist Black individuals resist structural racism and resolve the wealth gaps which have traditionally held them again? 

The core purpose for the synergy between black economics and blockchain know-how is that almost all Black individuals view cryptocurrencies backed not by an incumbent authority however by blockchain know-how as a strategy to earn cash whereas resisting centuries-long patterns of oppression such because the wealth-crippling results of redlining and zoning practices driving public funds away from their communities. 

They view crypto inclusion as their sole entry to generational wealth with out counting on a government’s permission. Investing in crypto is black individuals’s means of selecting a globally accessible, open, and permissionless different that locations monetary autonomy within the fingers of sovereign people’ fingers as a substitute of any sole middleman. 

Furthermore, they select to put money into digital cash that may’t be altered, debased, or entrenched as a result of their conventional mistrust of the standard banking system.

What’s extra, traders can get began with as little as $10! 

Isaiah Jackson, the writer of “Bitcoin and Black America,” characterizes conventional banking as a racist banking system and describes the idea of redlining, the place banks would previously actually draw crimson strains round communities that they needed to keep away from making loans.

Get Impressed

Lengthy Neck Women is an NFT challenge created by a 13-year-old Black woman that has generated hundreds of thousands in income.

Black Historical past Crypto Heroes

Listed below are some Black individuals who have contributed to the innovation and/or adoption of blockchain and cryptocurrency.

• Isaiah Jackson is the writer of “Bitcoin and Black America.” He believes to have discovered an answer with the brand new digital foreign money that originated in 2009 to the age-old drawback of cash, energy, and racism in the USA of America.
• Fairness Coin is a Black-owned cryptocurrency challenge that buys reasonably priced housing items all around the nation. On the similar time, token holders get the rights to property money flows.
• Russell Okung, a Professional Bowl deal with for the Carolina Panthers and a proponent of cryptocurrency, was the primary Nationwide Soccer League participant to gather a portion of his examine in cryptocurrency. Okung acquired 50% of his $13 million wage in Bitcoin utilizing Zap’s Strike product. His Twitter bio is “life, liberty, and #bitcoin.”
• Najah Roberts is a crypto entrepreneur and educator centered on closing wealth gaps within the Black group. She operates a brick-and-mortar crypto alternate that’s making crypto extra accessible to the unbanked.
• Olayinka Odeniran is the founding father of the Black Ladies Blockchain Council (BWBC), which supplies Black ladies worldwide with academic assets to know blockchain and construct wealth. BWBC has partnered with Ethereum software program firm ConsenSys to launch an internet program to practice half 1,000,000 Black ladies globally to grow to be blockchain builders by 2030. 
• Meta has launched the “Metaverse Tradition Sequence” to make the metaverse an area for Black tradition and creativity to thrive. Gabe Gault, the primary Artist and VR Creator in Residence, has constructed “I Am A Man,” an immersive expertise that pays homage to distinguished  Black figures like  Dr. King, Rosa Parks, the Tuskegee Airmen, and so on., to carry Black historical past alive.
• One / OFF and Tremendous Uncommon showcase and promote NFT artwork for hundreds of {dollars} in digital show rooms.

The Promise and Peril of Crypto for Black Buyers 

Blockchain know-how and cryptocurrencies empower Black traders to handle inequality by serving to take away many conventional limitations to buying, storing, and transferring wealth.

Nonetheless, whereas cryptocurrencies have the potential to fulfill Black customers’ expectations, in addition they pose dangers to privateness and monetary safety. Let’s look into the challenges and limitations Black traders have been encountering over these years.

• Whereas we’ve been constructing in direction of a extra equitable way forward for know-how with a rise within the variety of Black entrepreneurs over the previous years, nonetheless solely 2.3% of US companies are Black-owned, based on the Census, and with spectacularly excessive failure charges.  
• Based on the Nationwide Enterprise Capital Affiliation, solely about 3% of all enterprise capitalists are Black. Furthermore, Black entrepreneurs solely acquired $1.8 billion (1.2%) of the document $147 billion invested in U.S. Startups through the first half of 2021.
• Black individuals who invested in crypto had been hit disproportionately arduous through the current crypto winter. 

Regardless of these challenges, many Black founders and traders stay optimistic concerning the crypto sector’s potential for the group. Based on a Kansas Metropolis Federal Reserve report revealed in 2022, most Black traders imagine the wealth hole might be closed via investing in cryptocurrency. Crunchbase information exhibits that funding for Black web3 founders has solely elevated, and the crypto winter proved probably the most fruitful yr. 

Lastly, based on information from TechCrunch, it seems that traders are additionally in some methods bullish on Black founders, a change of tune in how Black startups have been funded.

Tell us your favourite Black Historical past Crypto Hero or a Black-owned crypto enterprise you’re keen on within the feedback under!

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