The introduction of Petro in 2018 coincided with a major economic crisis in Venezuela, prompting citizens to turn to alternatives like Bitcoin to protect their savings. However, Petro failed to gain significant traction and remained limited to trading solely on the Venezuelan Patria platform, which lacks modern security features.
While new features were introduced for Petro up until 2020, the government’s efforts to list the cryptocurrency on foreign exchanges were unsuccessful. Furthermore, the lack of acceptance as legal tender in the country hindered its widespread everyday use among the population, although it could still be used for tax payments.
Despite the ambitions and potential benefits of Petro, it ultimately fell short of its goals, leaving Venezuela to explore alternative options for economic stability.