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Allianz Advances with Blockchain-Based Token System

As the growing adoption of blockchain technology approaches the mainstream enterprises, the insurance giant, Allianz has also entered the blockchain sector. Allianz Global Corporate & Specialty SE (AGCS) has progressively been developing a token-based ecosystem utilizing blockchain technology.

Currently, the token is still in the experimental phase, although the basic core infrastructure has already been constructed, tested, and examined.

A spokesperson mentioned to Forbes:

AGCS is further exploring blockchain technology to simplify and accelerate cross-border insurance payments for its corporate customers. A project team is in the advanced stages of development for a token-based electronic payment system to allow for frictionless, transparent, and instantaneous money transfers for a range of different types [of] payments.

About the Token

The “internal token” developed by Allianz aims to tackle issues of the inefficiencies of the worldwide money transfer for its global affiliates. It will be run on a proprietary blockchain built by the company, Adjoint.

Oliver Volk, the blockchain expert at Allianz, told Coindesk, the token would be “very helpful to get rid of FX constraints and other stuff we have to optimize, especially if you talk to certain currencies which we do not accept at our headquarters and have to be reconverted.”

Global Enterprises and Blockchain Adoption

Recently reported, the US insurance giant, State Farm, and the United Services Automobile Association were testing a blockchain-based solution to streamline the insurance claims process.

Other large mainstream players have also been experimenting with blockchain in 2019. JP Morgan Chase announced its JPM Coin, Facebook introduced Libra, and Walmart has been taking a step towards developing its own digital currency as well.

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Coincover Sets Eyes on Crypto-based Insurance Service

Coincover, a Cardiff based start-up in the United Kingdom, has gone a notch higher by introducing a crypto-based insurance service. The primary objective of this move is deterring asset loss and theft in the cryptocurrency space.

The novelty of Coincover has made it a reckoning force in the technological sector. For instance, it was recently asked to be one of the eleven start-ups to showcase their innovative expertise and projects to a panel comprising of Silicon Valley enterprises.

Coincover offers an exceptional insurance service in the cryptocurrency sector. Information revealed by the firm’s website asserts that this service is unique as it is the only non-stop protection and monitoring service for crypto enthusiasts.

The company also acknowledges that all users whose digital assets are stored in software-based cryptocurrency wallets will have them protected for 24 hours. This cover will be available for at least 100 hundred distinctive tokens.

The menace of cryptocurrency theft

Coincover has also incorporated steadfast warning signals capable of raising the alarm in case of any malicious theft or withdraws. Cryptocurrency theft has proven to be a significant menace in the present space. Coincover seeks to eradicate this challenge whenever users are utilizing online wallets.

On the other hand, considerable transformations are being witnessed in the cryptocurrency space. For instance, Silvergate Bank, a dominant innovative business bank focused on cryptocurrency and Fintech businesses located in San Diego, recently contemplated being a crypto lender.

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Dr. Ben Goertzel—Creating an AI Marketplace for Paypal’s 286 Million Users

Exclusive interview with Dr. Ben Goertzel of SingularityNET: Part 2 (Link: Part 1)

Dr. Ben Goertzel is the founder and CEO of SingularityNET, a decentralized blockchain-based AI marketplace project. He is one of the world’s foremost experts in Artificial General Intelligence (AGI) and has decades of experience leveraging AI to create solutions in natural language processing, robotics and even national security. In addition to being the Chairman of the OpenCog Foundation and the Artificial General Intelligence Society, he has authored around 20 books and 140+ research papers.

In this second part, we discuss SingularityNET’s recent projects and collaborations with Toda Network, PICC Services and the adoption potential of its recent PayPal integration.

PayPal Integration to SingularityNET

The integration of PayPal’s service represents a significant step forward for SingularityNET and its community.

By making its AI marketplace easily accessible to PayPal’s 286 million users, SingularityNET opens its doors to a much wider scope of customers. Earlier versions of SingularityNET’s marketplace required customers to pay for AI services offered by AI agents in the network directly using the AGI utility token. With the recent update, the marketplace is now open for customers who have no experience with cryptocurrency.

On the integration of PayPal as an alternate payment interface to cryptocurrency for SingularityNET’s AI services, Goertzel said, “It opens the door to getting much broader utilization of AI services. What we have found when reaching out to people who are creating products that need AI is that they typically don’t have an Ethereum wallet and their company doesn’t want to be dealing with cryptocurrency due to volatility concerns.” Personally he added, “Eventually I would like to see the decentralized cryptocurrency economy render services like PayPal and the whole Fiat economy obsolete, but this is the reality we live in and this integration is a huge step for continued AI adoption.”

The increase in AI adoption enabled by PayPal integration will accelerate the realization of SingularityNET’s vision of a decentralized marketplace powered by blockchain technology and based on tokenomic incentives, serving customers across vertical markets and achieving increasing levels of Artificial General Intelligence.

Todalarity — Two Worlds Collide

In the global AI market, there are many imposters with vague ideas and a lot of underwhelming development looking to capitalize on the technological buzz and the corporate spending on automated processes. On a panel at the Blockshow 2019 by Cointelegraph—Toufi Saliba, CEO, Toda.Network acknowledged that true innovators and developers to partner within AI were in a minority of around 1% of the market, he views his partnership with Dr. Goertzel as “finding my 1%.”

Saliba and Goertzel have known each other for some time and both are strong believers of the libertarian and decentralized aspect of the blockchain world and want to see a democratic and participatory focus in the way money, information, AI and data are organized. In the first part of interview with Dr. Goertzel, we focused mainly on the philosophical aspects of AGI and the need for the emerging global brain to be decentralized and democratically governed. According to Goertzel, the union of SingularityNET and the Toda.Network—Todalarity—will be at the core of the “emerging global brain.”

After SingularityNET launched its initial Beta version on the Ethereum network, it became clear to Goertzel that the Ethereum blockchain was not able to meet the needs of the project. He said, “I knew that Toufi had the Toda.Network so I looked into it and found it had a very interesting architecture and it appeared to have the ability to scale to the needs that SingularityNET has right now.” Together they built a simple private prototype version of SingularityNET running on Toda and found it worked very well. Goertzel said, “It’s very fast and very simple to work with, I really became a believer in Toda after that, the technology is very cool and scalable. So I had to find a way to bring our two worlds together.”

Todalarity is essentially a product accelerator that aims to help new AI startups to integrate their products into the Toda.Network and SingularityNET blockchain ecosystems by providing some engineering assistance, advice and even some injections of funding. Goertzel highlighted, “There are two communities this we are aiming at—one is the developers with AI algorithms that would like to access SingularityNET as a marketplace and Toda as a tool to allow their AI to leverage decentralized networks. The second group we are reaching out to is the people who have products that need AI and we want to make it easy for them to access the decentralized SingularityNET or Toda.Network instead of going to a centralized vendor.”

PICC Financial Services

Singularity Studio, the for-profit spin-off of SingularityNET recently signed a “Strategic Cooperation Memorandum” with PICC Financial Services, the wholly-owned FinTech arm of the People’s Insurance Company of China (PICC). The MOU is to open a new accelerator in Beijing to promote the development of AI and blockchain-based services for the insurance market.

The initial focus is on applications such as AI-enabled marketing, linguistic and voice recognition, smart evaluation and settlement of claims, and the use of blockchain to manage the supply chain and identify fraud. Goertzel said, “One of the more interesting projects with PICC is regarding auto-insurance claims and being able to analyze photographs of damaged vehicles to give an estimate on repair costs. This is difficult and requires some reasoning from the AI agents and requires multiple AI tools to interact and provide a response to what’s wrong with the car.” He added, “They’re also having some issues involving speech analysis for Chinese language and we have some interesting AI tools for deep neural net speech analytics running in Singularity.”

Adoption is Key

Besides the financial benefits, the main impetus behind the many enterprise collaboration projects that SingualityNET is facilitating growth in the network’s AI agents. The AI agents interact and learn from each other, new challenges means more learning and teaching and AI agent copying. New stimulus and work mean that the AI is growing and together forming an intelligence greater than the sum of its parts.

Goertzel reiterates this sentiment saying, “Really by working with PICC, Cisco, Dominoes other large enterprises, it’s stimulating more and more AI for the network. Because in the course of voice analytics, or say image analytics regarding car engines, the AIs that are filling the network to serve PICC’s or Cisco’s needs remain in the network to be used for other purposes, so you’re building out just the overall capacity in the network, much more so than if we were just building proprietary software for these companies.“

Gemini Launches Insurance Company Resulting in the Highest Custody Insurance Coverage in the Crypto Market

Gemini announced the launch of its own cryptocurrency insurance company in its blog post, which resulted in becoming crypto custody with the broadest coverage at the moment. The company, named Nakamoto, Ltd., will become the world’s first captive company vested with securing Gemini custody; the company was being licensed the BMA (Bermuda Monetary Authority).

Gemini started their crypto custody business last year, Gemini noted that Nakamoto allows them to expand the current capacity of their insurance beyond the available coverage in the market with $200 million coverage. This seems to be the most extensive insurance coverage that has been purchased by any known cryptocurrency custodian.

This development makes it possible for users and customers of Gemini exchange to be able to purchase additional insurance from their different crypto assets. They also have hot wallet insurance coverage for holding individual cryptos.

Another news outlet reported that Aon and Marsh were the major traditional insurance brokers that will aid the existence and survival of Gemini’s Nakamoto, Ltd. Gemini founder, Cameron Winklevoss stated, “Obtaining meaningful insurance in the crypto industry remains a challenge, and our captive will help to increase our insurance capacity and move the industry forward.”

Yusuf Hussain, Head of Risk at Gemini, said that the development and advancement of Gemini’s custodial coverage give the space for other Gemini’s institutional clients to continue to meet up with their own regulatory requirements.

According to Hussain, the move “is consistent with Gemini’s approach of being a security-first, compliance-first, and regulatory friendly exchange and custodian.” The blog also added that Gemini Custody is currently under the regulation of the New York State Department of Financial Services (NYDFS).

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Insurance Firms in China and Hong Kong Count on Blockchain to Fast Track Coronavirus Claims Amid Outbreak

With 27 mainland Chinese cities on lockdown, insurance providers have been relying on blockchain technology to fast track claims payouts during the coronavirus outbreak,which has taken over 800 lives, surpassing the death toll of the severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) in 2003.

Xiang Hu Bao, an online mutual aid platform, a subsidiary of Ant Financial, is a “collective claims-sharing mechanism built on blockchain that offers basic health plans to its 104 million participants.” Most of its users are Chinese citizens from lower-tier cities, and in rural areas. By utilizing blockchain technology, settlements have been made more efficient, and fraudulent claims have been reduced.

The platform is also available on Alipay, another product owned by Ant Financial. The payout for coronavirus claims will be funded with Ant Finacial’s capital, apart from the other 100 critical illnesses that the users of the Xiang Hu Bao are eligible for.

According to the South China Morning Post, an Ant Financial representative from Beijing said,“Xiang Hu Bao has been able to process claims and make payouts to participants quicker, due to the decentralized, trust-free nature of blockchain technology. Claim applicants can submit their supporting documents as evidence while investigation firms can get immediate access to them on the blockchain. All parties involved can see the entire process.”

Blue Cross: Helping to ease pressure on healthcare services in Hong Kong

With over 30 confirmed cases in Hong Kong and one death, Blue Cross Asia Pacific Insurance, a subsidiary of the Bank of East Asia has been shortening the time spent on data verification. Its blockchain-based platform, which is able to handle more than 1,000 concurrent transactions in one second without human interaction has been helping to ease pressure on healthcare services in Hong Kong.

The platform has been launched since April 2019, there has been a record of double-digit growth of the number of policyholders using the app. By helping medical service providers to reduce the time spent on administrative duties, blockchain has been proven to be essential during the Wuhan coronavirus outbreak.

“Our blockchain-backed claims service has played a key role during the outbreak of the coronavirus by totally eliminating the paper process and the need for back-and-forth documents delivering to clinics. This really helps to mitigate the risk of infection from face-to-face contact,” said Patrick Wan, Managing Director of Blue Cross.

Insurance and blockchain go hand in hand

CB Insights Research indicated that although it is too early to tell whether blockchain technology can overcome the “legal and regulatory hurdles” to be adopted in the insurance industry, the “possibilities are endless, and insurance companies and startups alike are exploring insurance applications for the technology at full throttle.”

Insurance fraud has been costing the industry $40 billion a year, leading to higher premiums and worse coverage for consumers. By moving insurance claims from paper contracts onto a distributed and immutable ledger, blockchain can enable the elimination of fraud in the industry, which has been costing $40 billion a year.

Etherisc is a blockchain-based insurance product, powered by smart contracts, which was launched in October 2017, allowing passengers to purchase travel insurance using cryptocurrency or fiat (USD and Euros). Payouts were automatically transferred to the participants after a qualifying incident.

Blockchain used for coronavirus donations

Chinese conglomerate Alibaba starteda $144 million fund to purchase medical supplies for Wuhan, the city of the epicenter of the outbreak while offering AI computing power to research organizations for creating vaccines and treatments. Tencent also created a $42.7 million fund for medical supplies to be used in Wuhan.

However, there has been concern that the millions of dollars being donated for the public, as well as the protective equipment, are not being put to use where needed, and it has been reportedthat the equipment has been misdirected.

According to Syren Johnstone, an academic at the University of Hong Kong, a private blockchain network would “enable the recording and tracking of anything that is donated, from donation dollars to N95 masks.” By holding the person or organization accountable, donations for delivery could be tracked from the donor all the way to its final-use. Blockchain would also enable transparency for the general public to understand how their donations have been used and its progress. While a private blockchain is strictly controlled, it can also allow for public transparency for donors and donees, as well as authorities.

Wyoming State Says Cryptocurrency Represents Property, Allows Insurers to Include Digital Assets in Investment Portfolios

The US state of Wyoming has recently amended its insurance code that will allow local insurance companies to invest in digital assets like cryptocurrencies. The new amendment will only include insurance companies operating within the state. This important announcement is set to drive institutional money from local insurance into the cryptocurrency market.

The state sees cryptocurrencies as ppportunity

The new law, which will come into effect as from 1st July, specifies that an insurer may invest in digital assets. The state of Wyoming defines digital assets as a representation of economic, proprietary, or access rights, which is stored in a computer-readable format, and include digital securities, digital consumer assets, and virtual currencies, which include cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin.

The law defines cryptocurrencies as digital assets, which serve as a unit of account, a store of value, or a medium of exchange. It further defines cryptos as assets that are not recognized as a legal lender by the United States government. Based on the new legislation, insurance firms are now allowed to invest in various digital consumer assets, which are defined as digital assets that are bought or used mainly for household, personal, or consumptive purposes.

One of the US law firms, Kramer Levin, commented on the recent amendment made. However, the company recognized the amendment as the first provision of such nature made in the country. The firm stated that it remains to be seen whether insurance firms would take advantage of this law. This is because insurance firms are traditionally conservative with their investment portfolio as they normally invest in mortgages and high-grade bonds. Since the financial markets show huge volatility, the cryptocurrency’s non-correlation could be something beneficial for them.

The firm further identified that the law does not address some major issues like liquidity risk, accounting treatment, or valuation.

Caitlin Long, the CEO and founder of Wyoming-based forthcoming crypto bank Avanti also commented on the new law. She stated that most likely local insurance companies would offer this part of variable life policies instead of whole life because NAIC (National Association of Insurance Commissionaires) capital charge would be high.

First crypto-native bank set to be launched in the United States

Wyoming remains of the most blockchain and crypto-friendly states within the US. In February, Caitlin Long, the former Wall Street Executive who helped Wyoming state to enact 13 blockchain-enabling laws, revealed her plan to establish the first-ever crypto-native bank in 2021. The regulated bank is set to offer its crypto custody for big institutional money and to act as a bridge for federal reserve for payments. Caitlin is making this to become a reality because of the progressive Wyoming legislature that recognizes cryptocurrency as money and allows favorable tax treatment of crypto, among other friendly measures.

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How Blockchain Technology is Helping to Fight the Novel COVID-19 Pandemic

As the world battles with the Covid-19 pandemic, and it’s consequent economic and social effects: several world governments, agencies, and institutions are joining the fight to help reduce the spread of the virus while assiduously working to create a cure and a vaccine. For each country, the coronavirus pandemic has caused a major state of emergency, the Government’s role in addressing the issue is more visible at this time when compared to private and independent institutions.

In Italy for instance, the country has recorded a cataclysmic rise in the total number of deaths which stands at 18,279 along with a record 143,626 confirmed cases as of April 10th. While the government’s proactive measures in declaring a stay at home order, closure of businesses and, sanitization of public spaces are valiant efforts can be applauded; the efforts of individuals like Cristian Fracassi and Alessandro Romaioli in turning snorkeling masks into essential breathing equipment may not be as widely publicized or recognized globally.

While innovation and technology are being deployed at scale to free the world of Covid-19, the role of blockchain technology to combat aspects of the pandemics’ negative effects has been a particularly potent weapon in this fight to restore our supply lines and authenticate information, as well as cross-border remittance.

Blockchain Gets Busy

Blockchain technology remains a game-changer in the use of encrypted open-source ledger in the processing of data. In its own right, it came as a disruptive technology that is now gradually being embraced by technology-dependent and futuristic firms worldwide. With the outbreak of the coronavirus disease in late 2019, many blockchain-based firms have launched innovative ways to make a difference in this global medical upset. Few of the application of blockchain technology in the fight against coronavirus is outlined below;

Insurance Claims

The coronavirus disease creates a major health concern that is enough to create an unbalanced book for medical insurance companies worldwide. With over a million cases all over the world, the impact on Health Management Organizations cannot be underestimated. In China where the outbreak began, Ant Financials online Mutual Aid blockchain-based platform Xiang Hu Bao has introduced a new function to process several coronavirus claims. This function undoubtedly has helped the firm reduce in-person contact as these claims are made online.

Education

With the coronavirus pandemic, there’s been a major disruption in education across all levels as the stay at home order looms. Higher educational institutions are resorting to online alternatives to take classes and write exams and Odem is providing free access to its blockchain-powered educational and credentialing platform to higher institutions. While the Odem platform may not be a perfect replacement for the traditional classroom experience, it definitely is helping to bridge the learning gap in these trying times.

Donation Tracking

The humanitarian grace of many people was reawakened with the Covid-19 disease outbreak. With donations coming from sports celebrities, business leaders, etc. HyperChain, Hangzhou based blockchain startup has created a donation tracking system that will help donors see where funds are urgently needed. With this ingenuity, HyperChain has raised millions of dollars in coronavirus donations with the promise of transparency and responsibility.

Algorand

The Algorand Foundation launched a health survey website to record public health trends during the novel coronavirus pandemic. With this survey website called iReport-COVID, infected persons can give an account of their experiences anonymously with an assurance that their identities will be protected.

Cross Border Payment Solution

The better perk of blockchain technology and its associated cryptocurrencies is to facilitate financial transactions worldwide. With financial institutions crippled, cross country payment solutions require an alternative which is best obtained from blockchain-powered cryptocurrencies.

Need for Applause?

With all that is being done with blockchain technology of which just a fraction is documented in this article, one might want to give a loud applause for these contributions but until a final victory over the coronavirus disease is achieved, all active stakeholders must keep working till global health is restored and life returns to normal in our cities. It is then that our applause to our medical practitioners, scientists, and technology deployed can be resounding.

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Tyler Winklevoss Predicts $500K BTC price as MassMutual Insurance Giant Buys up $100 million in Bitcoin

As Bitcoin gains further mainstream momentum with US insurance giant MassMutual buying up $100 million in BTC for its portfolio, Bitcoin billionaire Tyler Winklevoss appears to be gaining confidence in his $500,000 per BTC prediction.

Bitcoin’s (BTC) mainstream appeal is gaining momentum as insurance giant Massachusetts Mutual Life Insurance Co. (MassMutual) buys up $100 million of the cryptocurrency for its general investment account.

According to the WSJ on Dec. 10, the $100 million BTC investment is actually quite small for the US-based insurance company whose general investment account totaled nearly $235 billion as of Sept. 30 this year.

Gemini crypto exchange founder, Tyler Winklevoss has been very public in his prediction for the BTC price to reach $500K per crypto and replace gold as the preferred safe-haven asset.

While the investment may be a small one for the insurance giant, the move to diversify its portfolio with the pioneer cryptocurrency signifies further momentum for Bitcoin and its acceptance as a safe have asset according to Winklevoss.

As the Wall Street Journal broke the news of MassMutual’s $100 million BTC investment, Winklevoss tweeted:

“And another domino falls on the yellow brick road to #Bitcoin being worth $500k per bitcoin. Who’s next?”

MassMutual purchased the Bitcoin through a New York-based fund management company called NYDIG, which has over $2 billion in BTC and crypto-assets under management. MassMutual also acquired a $5 million minority equity stake in NYDIG, as reported by the WSJ.

The Bitcoin price reached a new all-time high in late November at $19,835, topping its 2017 high, and is currently trading under the $18,000 level, approximately gaining 150% year-to-date.

Market Cap of $9 Trillion and BTC Price of $500,000 by 2030

In a recent interview with CNBC, Tyler and Cameron Winklevoss predicted that the Bitcoin price will surge to $500,000 and replace gold as a store of value with a $9 trillion market cap by 2030.

The Gemini crypto exchange co-founders said in the that Bitcoin is a better store of value than gold and BTC’s market cap will likely grow to around $9 trillion as it transforms into gold 2.0.

Tyler Winklevoss said:

“Our thesis is that Bitcoin is gold 2.0, that it will disrupt gold, and if it does that, it has to have a market cap of $9 trillion, so we think it could price one day at $500,000 of Bitcoin.”

According to the billionaire Bitcoin investors, the room for BTC’s price growth makes it a good investment even at its current high levels.

“So at $18,000 bitcoin, it’s a hold or at least if you don’t have any, it’s a buy opportunity because we think there’s a 25x from here.”

The Winklevoss’s are firm believers in Bitcoin’s and explain its sensational surge as being due to an increasing number of retail and institutional investors realizing that BTC is the best store of value against inflation offering much higher returns than gold.

Fitch Warns El Salvador’s Bitcoin Adoption Will Hurt Local Insurers’ Credit Ratings

Fitch Ratings Inc has warned that El Salvador’s move to adopt Bitcoin as a legal tender poses a severe risk to its local insurance firms.

On June 9, Nayib Bukele, the President of El Salvador, influenced lawmakers to vote and eventually passed the Bitcoin law. The country will formally adopt Bitcoin as legal tender on September 9, exempting it from capital gains tax and requiring tax collectors and local businesses to accept the cryptocurrency.

However, Fitch Ratings, a US-based credit rating agency, has announced that El Salvador’s decision to embrace Bitcoin as legal tender will likely be a negative credit exchange for local insurance firms with exposure to the crypto due to the earning volatility higher foreign exchange risks.

Fitch further stated that El Salvador’s local insurance companies would be under pressure by converting Bitcoin to dollars to avoid price risks quickly. If that is not possible, the insurers could face massive losses if Bitcoin plunges its value, the agency said.

Fitch further warned of additional operational and regulatory risks involving El Salvador’s adoption of Bitcoin as a legal tender, mentioning that regulators across the world have not defined the crypto’s practical implementation.

Fitch emphasised that such a lack of implementation shows that Bitcoin is not expected to be widely implemented by insurance companies to make claims, benefit payments or provide policies denominated in the digital currency.

The underlying regulations governing Bitcoin’s official status remains uncertain, with September’s deadline looming. Fitch describes the process as “unnecessarily rushed,” adding that the plan “leaves insurance companies with very little time to adapt.”

Fitch, tasked with providing ratings to global insurance companies, says that Bitcoin is a risky reserve asset, citing the crypto’s “lack of transparency.” The agency further noted that El Salvador’s Bitcoin adoption could leave the local insurance industry even more fragile as many insurers already hold large caches of flow-rated Salvadorian government bonds.

In July, Fitch-rated El Salvador’s sovereign debt and local insurance industry with a B-rating (negative outlook), i.e. low credit quality securities, mainly sovereign bonds. The agency described the new Bitcoin law as one of the many reasons for maintaining a B-rating, regarded below investment grade. The rating agency stated that the adoption of Bitcoin as legal tender could negatively affect El Salvador’s debt relief talks with the IMF (International Monetary Fund), further debasing the country’s bonds.

Cryptocurrency as A National Currency

The IMF also warned El Salvador about the risks that come with making Bitcoin legal tender. Last month, the international agency stated that elevating Bitcoin into the status of national currency could harm the country’s financial integrity, macro-financial stability, consumer protection, and the environment.

The IMF also noted that cryptocurrency could cause price fluctuations, difficulty setting fiscal policy, and negative environmental impacts. The agency also talked about crypto assets that could pose security concerns as cryptocurrency could evade taxes, fund terrorism, and launder ill-gotten money.

However, politicians in many other nations have been eager to follow El Salvador’s making cryptocurrency a national currency. Latin America has especially pushed their respective countries to be more open to Bitcoin and other crypto-assets.

Lemonade to Offer Blockchain-Powered Climate Insurance for Farmers in Emerging Markets

Lemonade, a top American insurance company, has revealed the formation of the Lemonade Crypto Climate Coalition meant to offer blockchain-enabled climate insurance to the most vulnerable farmers across the globe.

Through its nonprofit organization dubbed the Lemonade Foundation, Lemonade has partnered with other companies like Chainlink, Avalanche, DAOstack, Hannover Re, Tomorrow.io, Pula, and Etherisc as founding coalition members.

Based on the Lemonade Foundation’s objective of rendering environmental and social change through technology, the coalition is being established as a Decentralized Autonomous Organization (DAO) to create and distribute parametric and instantaneous weather insurance to livestock keepers and subsistence farmers in emerging markets.

The climate insurance will be developed on Avalanche’s proof of stake (PoS) as a stablecoin-denominated decentralized application (dapp).

With the initial rollout expected in Africa this year, farmers will have the ability to make and receive payments using local currencies or stablecoins.

Daniel Schreiber, a director at the Lemonade Foundation, welcomed the collaboration and stated:

“By using a DAO instead of a traditional insurance company, smart contracts instead of insurance policies, and oracles instead of claims professionals, we expect to harness the communal and decentralized aspects of web3 and real-time weather data to deliver affordable and instantaneous climate insurance to the people who need it most.”

With Africa having nearly 300 million smallholder farmers who face real climate risks, Rose Goslinga believes blockchain-powered climate insurance will come in handy in safeguarding their livelihoods.

The co-founder of Kenya-based insurtech Pula added:

“This is where the power of the Lemonade Crypto Climate Coalition comes in: An on-chain solution that can be immediately impactful at scale will allow farmers to finally get financially protected against the increasingly frequent risks such as drought.”

Blockchain is emerging as one of the sought-after technologies for tackling climate change. For instance, Samsung Electronics announced plans to utilize blockchain in a climate-focused reafforestation program in Madagascar earlier this year.