Turkey is increasing its efforts to become the next crypto and blockchain hub
Turkish residents continuously maintain a bullish attitude towards crypto transactions despite the bear markets. Ismail H. Polat, a media lecturer at Kadir Has University in Istanbul, said the driving force is high inflation.
Recent reports show that the Turkish crypto industry is working to build the crypto ecosystem in the middle of the bear market. The Turkish blockchain industry players see the bear market as an opportunity to improve the ecosystem. They strive to do this by bringing home the popular Ethereum event DevCon7.
Turkey is among the countries with the greatest interest in the crypto market. The community consists of Web3 startups, university clubs, blockchain developers, academics and digital investors.
High inflation rate increased Turkish crypto adoption
Turkey hosted notable crypto events such as Istanbul Blockchain Week, EITHistanbul and Blockchain Economy Istanbul 2022 Summit and is still striving for more. However, the country clarified one thing Blockchain Economy Summit: confidence in crypto remains steadfast even with the bear market.
Erkan Oz, an economist, says that the high inflation rate is the main contributor to the growing crypto traction in Turkey. The economist further explained Turkey’s slow institutional adoption of crypto. He said that blockchain startups and projects have not fully taken off due to the lack of clear rules in the ecosystem.
Oz called on the Turkish government to establish a legal framework to protect digital asset investments and support blockchain and digital assets.
The growing crypto market in Turkey got the Bitcoin maximalists and the so-called Shibarmy troops working to bring DevCon 7 to Istanbul. DevCon 7 is the largest conference for the Ethereum ecosystem. The top local players supported the use of DevCon 7, resulting in wide awareness.
Twitter handles of people in the Turkish blockchain community now carry the phrase #DevconIstanbul after their names. This is because the initiative expanded very quickly from digital to physical work, like what happened with ETHIstanbul after the Ethereum merger.
Turkey wants to give exposure to the developer community
Turkey lags behind other countries in terms of crypto startups and developers. Turan Sert, the Turkish author of two blockchain and Defi books, said the resonance between Turkish and foreign student clubs contributes to the growing crypto ecosystem. He explained that the blockchain student clubs had a positive effect in driving up the number of developers in Turkey.
The DevCon7 Istanbul campaign has been all over Twitter and other social media platforms in September. However, the conference was to be held in Bogota 11-14. October after delays due to the COVID pandemic.
Tansel Kaya, CEO of Mind stone and an academic at Kadir Has University, commented on the importance of bringing the DevCon event to Istanbul. Kaya said bringing the event to the country will benefit talented students who cannot attend such events.
Kaya further explained that they look forward to having their student communities and software developers meet top developers at the DevCon event.
Featured image from Pixabay, Chart: TradingView.com
