It may sound like a marketing stunt, but the founders of the first LGBTQ cryptocurrency said they want to harness the economic power of the community with the goal of "changing the world."
El maricoin, a play on words drawn from a homophobic insult in Spanish, was launched on Friday in a week-long pilot test involving 10 businesses in Chueca, known as the LGBTQ neighborhood of Spain's capital Madrid.
Maricoin sponsors aim for the virtual currency to begin trading early next year, paving the way for it to be used as a means of payment at LGBTQ businesses and events around the world.
"As we move this economy, why shouldn't our community benefit from it, instead of banks, insurance companies, or large corporations that often don't help LGBT + people?" co-founder Juan Belmonte, 48, told the Thomson Reuters Foundation by phone.
Belmonte, a hairdresser and businessman, said the idea for the LGBTQ cryptocurrency came to him while partying with friends at Madrid's Pride event in July this year.
But it traces the origins of the project to 2017, when the ultra-conservative group HazteOir launched a campaign against the rights of transgender people by sending a bus through Spain with the words: “Boys have penises, girls have vulvas. Do not be fooled."
The conservative Christian group's campaign was quickly banned by Spanish authorities, but Belmonte said it made him realize that he "had to do something" to help harness the economic influence of the LGBTQ community in the fight against homophobia.
The global LGBTQ market is huge, with Swiss bank Credit Suisse research suggesting that it would rank as the world's fourth-largest economy, behind Japan but ahead of Germany in terms of purchasing power.
A 2018 study by Kantar Consulting and the LGBTQ social network Hornet estimated the purchasing power of the community in the United States alone at $ 1 trillion in 2016, almost equal to that of African American or Hispanic consumers.
Maricoin is backed by Miami-based venture capital firm Borderless Capital, and the initiative's chief executive, Francisco Álvarez, said 8,000 people were already on a waiting list to buy maricoins before the coin. start trading.
According to their plans, the LGBTQ cryptocurrency will be accepted as payment by companies - from restaurants and cafes to shops and hotels - that have signed an "equality manifesto."
Among other things, the manifesto defends the rights of LGBTQ people and “all people in a situation of exclusion”, in addition to advocating a “social, ethical, transversal and transparent economy”.
"The establishments that accept our currency will appear on our map, which will function as an LGBTI guide for anyone visiting any city in the world," said Álvarez, 48.
"If they violate any of the points of our anti-discrimination manifesto, for example if they fire a pregnant woman for her pregnancy, they will be expelled from maricoin," he added.
The coin will also have its own LGBT-related language: transfers between maricoin users are called "trans."
Mr. Álvarez and Mr. Belmonte also hope that the company can generate a funding source for LGBTQ businesses and community initiatives around the world.
"We will be able to grant microcredits for people to set up a small LGBTI cafe in Colombia, or to support projects that help queer refugees flee from countries where they would be stoned to death," he said.
"We hope to change the world."
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