The country has long been very relaxed in dealing with virtual currencies. Victims are mainly young people who are socially marginalized
Elena Moreno was just 17 years old when her boyfriend’s mother incited her to invest in cryptocurrencies. She invested her first self-earned 50 euros in Bitcoins. It all sounded good, especially after the financial crisis that left so many people without funds and young people without jobs. Another thing that makes investing in Bitcoin more exciting is using Bitcoin trading AI.
Elena was in the best circles, even Spanish celebrities invested in Bitcoins, and there were soon the first crypto ATMs in Spain. But as quickly as Moreno went up financially, she also lost everything again: “In the end, everything was opaque for me and felt like in the casino,” says the Catalan, who is now doing a forestry education and prefers to earn money in the real world. She no longer wants to know anything about online academies and financial markets: “I avoid what is sold virtually.”
As in the casino
Ibai Artola is different. He is a crypto expert and is now also a financial advisor. The young farmer from the Basque Country actually wanted to be at the Madrid mega-event “Mundo Crypto” on Saturday: “But unfortunately I couldn’t because we are building a new office.”
“No way back”
7000 visitors informed themselves about better investment strategies and other crypto courses. In the run-up, there was a lot of polemic because minors from all over Spain made a pilgrimage to Madrid. The Basque sees the danger that some will fall for the quick money like in the casino, but he warns against scaremongering: “There is no way back. Virtual currencies remain, no matter what horror scenarios conventional investors warn against.”
The negative news on cryptocurrencies has not stopped in Spain recently after the country handled it loosely for years.
It started with a festival in a socially difficult suburb of Barcelona in April. Thousands of minors became crypto fans after the conferences and courses, who then gave up their social lives to get rich, like the speaker.
ALSO READ: Accounts of Crypto-Funded Political Campaigns
Warning from the authorities
Under pressure from desperate parents, the Financial Market Authority decided to better control advertising for crypto assets. She warned before the event “Mundo Crypto” in Madrid. Some of the advertising companies are dubious and not registered in Spain.
Madrid is a crypto stronghold in Europe. Spain generally has fewer inhibitions towards sects or similar problematic organizations, which is why it has long been watched as the youth were openly seduced with crypto promises.
Sects appear openly
The US sect Scientology is allowed to flaunt itself openly in the center of Madrid, for example, and the Spanish order Opus Deí, which is controversial elsewhere, is trying everywhere to win students over to its ultra-conservative teachings.
In addition, there is a propensity of the Spaniards for gambling. They have the largest lottery in the world and almost 700,000 registered gambling addicts – more and more of them are teenagers. This has also shaken up the Ministry of Consumer Affairs: Advertising for betting shops has been banned since 2021. The fact that Americans such as the IM Academy chose Spain as a location also has to do with the fact that virtual currencies have not had a bad reputation here so far. Until recently, they were even massively promoted, especially the technology on which they are based: blockchain.
But the mood is slowly tipping. Some celebrities who were supposed to appear at the industry meeting in Madrid and invest in virtual currencies themselves have backtracked due to the negative news.