Lulacoin, Mitocoin and Other ‘Polarized’ Crypto Assets Devalue and Die

Created to cash in on the polarization of the 2022 presidential elections, crypto assets that bet on the popularity of candidates Jair Bolsonaro (PL) and Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva (PT) did not take off.

Lulacoin, Lula 2022, BolsoLula, Mitocoin, Mito22 and Bonoro Mitocoin 2022 are some of the assets found on trading platforms. All motionless.

Some were launched on trading platforms more than a year ago, but all eight projects identified by the Sheet or are inactive or have insignificant movements at the moment.

Of much lower quality than the most well-known virtual currencies, such as Bitcoin and Ethereum, the assets named in honor of Lula and Bolsonaro are on the shelf of shitcois (crap coins, in a free translation), jargon used for copies of other projects, with security flaws and that could never be used in exchange relationships.

This largely explains the public’s lack of interest in these assets, according to Paulo Aragão, founder of CriptoFácil, a content platform specializing in the sector. “Projects are so bad that they don’t get engagement and end up dying,” he commented.

Created just over a year ago and in the hands of 141 investors, BolsonaroCoin registered only one movement in the last two days in relation to the consultation made by the report this Thursday (9).

The most significant project panned by the Sheet was a futures contract based on NFT, an acronym for non-fungible token, which bets on the victory or defeat of Bolsonaro against Lula, is from the American brokerage FTX.

In this case, the contract literally works like a bet. The interested party can operate long, which means winning with Bolsonaro’s victory, or sold, making money if the current president loses the dispute to the PT.

Despite the company’s relevance in the segment —one of the largest in the world—, the product aimed at the Brazilian election has lost value since its creation last year and also has almost zero turnover at the moment.

When launched by FTX in May last year, the token focused on the run for the Plateau had a unit value of US$1 (R$4.88). It is now worth US$ 0.28 (R$ 1.37).

In the last 24 hours before the consultation, the volume traded was US$ 2 (R$ 9.77). “It’s a project that is clearly at a standstill, anyone with a hundred dollars in their hands is still completely manipulating that amount”, commented Aragão.

The absence of other names that compete for the Presidency of the Republic in FTX products is the result of the methodology that the company has adopted since Donald Trump ran for reelection, opined an industry manager who, by strategy of the institution where he works, cannot have the name published in articles that cite candidates for elective positions.

“The bet is always against or in favor of the candidate in power,” he said. “It’s a model closer to what the US election is like.”

This same manager believes that the lack of interest in this type of contract is also related to the profile of the candidates, as none of them have positions openly in favor of cryptocurrencies and, therefore, do not attract enthusiasts of these investments.

“In addition, this market is operating at a low point at the moment”, he commented. “So there is no reason for a person to stop trading Bitcoin, for example, to invest in a purely speculative asset.”

Experts who spoke to Folha say that none of the crypto assets identified by the report has any official relationship with the candidates.

Um dos ativos, a Bolsonarocoin22, é descrito em seu perfil no Twitter como um “token NFT criado para fins sociais e ajuda humanitária, bem como para os apoiadores e simpatizantes do presidente Bolsonaro”.

Even if the creator proposes to support one of the candidates, electoral legislation does not allow fundraising or payment of campaign expenses through virtual currencies, explains lawyer Flávio Willeman, former judge of TRE-RJ (Tribunal Regional Electoral Council of Rio de Janeiro).

“It is not possible to create a virtual currency because of the exclusive competence of the Union to legislate on financial law”, explains Willeman. He reinforces that voters should not confuse this ban with the virtual crowdfunding, which is legal and is intended to collect donations from individuals through internet platforms.

Crypto… what? Understand what cryptocurrencies are

Token, in computer language, is a technology that creates codes by sequencing symbols (such as letters, for example). This allows you to create a kind of password and link it to an electronic file.

Encoding guarantees the authenticity of a file sold over the internet. This makes it unique and potentially valuable.

The name cryptoactive is used because it adopts the principle of cryptography. It is the same logic used by the technology of chaining code blocks (blockchain) that guarantees the security of virtual currencies.

Purists do not always like to call any type of asset that uses blockchain technology a virtual currency, as they consider that to be a currency it is necessary to gather other attributes, such as being widely used as a means of payment.