The Future of Cryptocurrency and Philanthropy

As most people assume, Bitcoin and other cryptocurrency are in the tech industry for trading and investing in order to make a profit on the market. However, if you consider the alternative which is philanthropy, a few companies are quite profound at doing just that.

Using Cryptocurrencies to Fundraise

Many charities are experimenting with cryptocurrency donations and some of the most prominent names involved are Red Cross, Save the Children, United Way and the Electronic Frontier Foundation. There is a clear ascension in number of donations with cryptocurrency. One of the biggest funds for donors, Fidelity Charitable, holds more than 69 million dollars worth of crypto donations as of 2017.

More recently, a number of programmes and schemes in the world of crypto philanthropy have come to notice. Such platforms embrace crowdfunding sites like BitHope for donating Bitcoin to your charity of choice. Other apps like GiveTrack and Alice are used to trace the movement of funds from account to charity, all on Blockchain, and confirm that select foundations have received allocated donations.

Non Profit Specific Coins

Besides making donations with Bitcoin and tracking its progress on applications, there are a number of coins created by organisations for their social and ongoing projects. There are coins for exact purposes like the one created by Charity: Water, called Clean Water Coin for raise money for the charity that works to supply clean drinking water to people all over the world. Another called Pinkcoin, is a coin that alerts traders use it to donate to specific charities as well as get a return on their funding. This coin is registered as a major cryptocurrency contender and does well in the market.

Foundations for Crypto Donations

An anonymous philanthropist has recently created a charity foundation that aspires to donate 5,057 Bitcoins. The charity is called the Pineapple Fund and has reached out to numerous contributors who have collectively given away 56 million dollars to 56 chosen charities. The creator, 'pine' holds the slogan, “Because once you have enough money, money doesn’t matter.” as a justification for his contributions.

With this use of Blockchain, a more credible process of donations to charities can be established. Most people have little trust in the working of bog charity organisations, speculating that these use a sizeable portion for their operations and little goes into the actual relief funds or projects. However, with a Blockchain system these doubts can be resolved with transparency in transactions, decreased operating costs, and overall efficiency in the process. These cynical ideas can be undone and lead to increased donations.

In a few years, with the success of Bitcoin and Blockchain technology, these foundations can all have their own set of cryptocurrencies or coins to maintain the flow of donations digitally. An exchange can be created on a token system focused solely on the purchase and selling of these coins by traders and donators. This may even create a new approach to philanthropy where charities as well as philanthropists profit from trade of foundation specific coins for the improvement of those in need. Gathering funds could be made easy for Non Profit organisations by mining of tokens.

Although the future holds so many possibilities, there are still limitations that stand in the way. Blockchain is a relatively new and unexplored system that still has a lot to be discovered by a majority of the public before it becomes mainstream. Most countries have not defined their legal stance on the trade of Bitcoin and many people do not have enough grasp of its operations.

Thus, it will be a while before crypto philanthropy is recognised and utilised for donations and fundraising.