Crypto Donations to Ukraine Jump to $20M
FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried and Chain.com CEO Deepak Thapliyal have contributed.
Updated May 9, 2023 at 3:39 a.m. UTC
The Ukraine government’s call for donations to resist the Russian invasion and provide aid to those affected has been embraced by the crypto community with nearly $20 million raised in ether and bitcoin.
- Earlier on Monday, the donation figure hit the $10 million mark, but a significant uptick in donations during the day drove the figure past $20 million, according to on-chain data reviewed by Elliptic.
- On Monday, Binance announced it would donate $10 million crypto to the effort and launched a crowdfunding portal to encourage its users to donate more.
- According to on-chain data, over $6 million has been received in the effort’s Ethereum wallet.
- That includes $1.1 million in tether and $109,000 in USDC.
- On-chain data shows that FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried donated $250,000 in tether and Chain.com CEO Deepak Thapliyal donated 100 ether (about $277,000).
- Data shows that Ukraine is holding the crypto in a ERC-20 wallet and hasn’t made a withdrawal.
- Ukraine’s Bitcoin wallet has received $4.2 million. The country has already withdrawn $2.9 million of that amount.
- Over the weekend, Russian art collective Pussy Riot helped form a decentralized autonomous organization (DAO) that raised $3 million in ether for the war effort and humanitarian relief.
- A separate wallet for donations to the Ukraine army, run by the charity Come Back Alive, has raised $6 million since its inception in mid-2021.
UPDATE (Feb. 28, 13:01 UTC): Updates donation figure throughout, adds Binance's donation in second bullet.