Ukraine receives donation of $5 million worth of ETH from creator Vitalik Buterin

The conflict between Ukraine and Russia is still in full swing after more than a month. From the start of the battle, cryptocurrency has been proving itself as a means of supporting the people and military. Vitalik Buterin, the creator of Ethereum, has decided to stop sitting on the sidelines and donate $5 million (3.8 million pounds) to Ukraine.

More precisely, Buterin has donated 750 Ethereum (ETH) to Unchain Fund, a charity set up by blockchain activists. Unchain Fund was established to help Ukraine on a humanitarian front. In addition to 750 ETH for Unchain Fund, Buterin also transferred 750 ETH to Aid For Ukraine. This fund was set up by the Ukrainian Ministry of Digital Transformation. Aid For Ukraine has announced via Twitter that it is very happy with the donation of 2.5 million dollars (1.89 million pounds) from the generous Buterin.

Buterin remains humble

It is to Vitalik Buterin’s credit that he himself has not disclosed anything about the donations. The only reason we know about the donations is because of the funds’ acknowledgements and its Ethereum Name Service (ENS) domain ‘vitalik.eth’ that contains the donations.

Thanks to the gift from the founder of Ethereum, crypto donations now exceed 100 million dollars (75 million pounds). In particular, the Ukrainian government, the NGO fund Come Back Alive, UkraineDAO, Unchain Fund, Aid for Ukraine and Cyberpolice Ukraine have received a lot of funding from the crypto community.

What are the donations used for?

The money is used for various purposes by the Ukrainian government and charities. The military and humanitarian initiatives, among others, benefit from the generosity of the crypto community. Cryptocurrency donations are proving to be a simple and fast way to come to the rescue in an emergency.

International payments via cryptocurrencies do not require the intervention of financial institutions and arrive directly at their destination. However, the money must then be converted into fiat money to buy stuff from it. After all, we are not yet at the point where you can pay with bitcoin and ethers everywhere.

Interestingly, the first bitcoin donations started coming in on February 8. At that time, the threat from Russia was already increasing and Ukrainian volunteers and hacker organizations decided to send some support to Ukraine.

Bitcoin price up 35% in the month after invasion

In the month after the Russian army invaded Ukraine, the bitcoin price has risen by 35 percent. It shows that bitcoin is now able to defend itself well in times of major geopolitical turmoil and troubling macroeconomic conditions.

That being said, the bitcoin price is currently experiencing some downtimes. After an upturn to USD 48,000 (£36,400), we are now back below $45,000 (£34,000). Although there are some exciting things planned for Bitcoin 2022 today that can potentially boost the price. In particular, today’s presentation of Samson Mow at 4:45 PM promises to be a blast, according to the speaker.