Bitcoin is helping young people in Afghanistan bring food to their tables. Digital currency enables the unfortunate to invest and move their money since people in Afghanistan still rely on cash on a daily basis.

For instance, Farhan Hotak is a 22-year-old Afghan investor. During the last few weeks, Hotak has helped his family often flee to the province of Zabul in southern Afghanistan. The young Afghan investor has been investing in cryptocurrencies through Binance, as the local currency was hitting its all-time low.

“In Afghanistan, we don’t have platforms like PayPal, Venmo, or Zelle, so I have to depend on other things,” said Hotak.

Afghanistan, like 3rd world countries, still relies on cash for operations. Therefore, Hotak’s crypto wallet is of no use. However, the 22-year old investor has found ways to include himself in the global economy from his house in Afghanistan.
“I have very, very, very limited resources to do anything. I’m interested in the crypto world, because I have earned a lot, and I see a lot of potential in myself that I can go further,” he said.

“There’s no bank I can go to right now, no ATM,” said Ali Latifi, a journalist born and based in Kabul. “I live above two banks and three ATMs, but they’ve been off since Thursday,” said Latifi, referring to the Thursday before the palace ouster.

Bitcoin changes Lives in 3rd world Countries

Sangar Paykhar, a Kabul native currently living in the Netherlands, has been in constant touch with relatives there in recent weeks. He said that many who live paycheck to paycheck were, at first, borrowing money from others to get by, but now, those able to lend out cash have started conserving their funds.

“They’ve realized the regime has collapsed” and that those they are lending to “might not have a job tomorrow,” said Paykhar.

On the other hand, Musa Ramin was among the people who queued outside a bank in a fruitless attempt to withdraw cash. But unlike other Afghans in line with him that day, months earlier, he had invested a portion of his net worth into crypto. Ramin had been burned before by a rapidly depreciating currency, and decentralized digital money had proven to be a trusted safeguard.

In 2020, on what was meant to be a brief layover on a trip from London to Kabul, Ramin got stuck in Turkey. A one-week, mandatory Covid quarantine ballooned into six months.
“I converted all my money to the lira,” he said. After the Turkish currency began to spiral, Ramin said his capital was cut in half, and he was forced to conserve it. “That is when I discovered bitcoin.”

With all flights canceled and no other options for departure, Ramin realized he needed to find alternative ways to support himself while stranded in Turkey during the pandemic-related shutdown. That’s when he started trading crypto.

“At first, I lost a lot of money,” he said. But he’s since gotten the swing of managing his digital assets, thanks to Twitter and tutorials on YouTube.