There are quite a few projects out there that have tried to capitalize on the Bitcoin hype train. Given the current Bitcoin price trend, that is not surprising. Bitcoen is a very different type of digital currency that is borderline discriminatory. Advertised as a way to bring Jewish communities together, it is a Russian-designed international Jewish currency. Let’s see what Bitcoen is all about.

Bitcoen is not Bitcoin

Purpose-built cryptocurrencies are sometimes built on dubious claims for specific functions. For example, every cryptocurrency ICO these days issues an Ethereum-based token, even though they could often just use Ether instead. Then again, there would be little room to make money if no customer tokens were issued in the first place.

Bitcoen is an electronic cryptocurrency based on the idea of Bitcoin as we know it today. The project was conceived by Viacheslav Semenchuk, a Russian businessman. He is in talks with various exchange platforms to turn Bitcoen into a currency designed to purchase goods and services. Rather than create a new global currency altogether, it was designed to be utilized by members of Jewish communities worldwide. This is a bit discriminatory, to say the least.

Bitcoen is designed to be pegged to the U.S. dollar, with every token to be issued having a net value of US$1 and retaining its value over time. If things go as planned, there will be 100 million Bitcoen in circulation when everything is said and done. The hope is then to raise the total market cap to US$1.5 billion in the first two years. This seems to hint at an ICO of some sort, although there doesn’t appear to be any reason to think Bitcoen will ever go over US$1 in value either.

Anyone in the world will be able to purchase Bitcoen tokens, which already defeats the purpose of having it be for the global Jewish community specifically. It is possible very few initial holders would be members of the Jewish faith, since there is no limitation as to who can buy large amounts of tokens. This seems like an interesting idea, but the way this group has been going about things is certainly raising a lot of questions. Indeed, it remains unclear how these tokens will be purchased in the first place.

Bitcoen will be managed by a so-called Council of Six comprised of Jewish representatives (once again, borderline discriminatory). This idea will probably receive considerable backlash from the Jewish community itself, as it may not necessarily feel it has any use for a native digital currency. Despite claims by Semenchuk to the contrary, there is no real evidence that this project is truly viable.

There are a lot of unanswered questions related to Bitcoen. It is unclear if this is a digital token issued on Ethereum, a cryptocurrency like Bitcoin, or a digital promise like OneCoin. The approach of launching this project almost defeats its entire long-term purpose altogether, which is pretty strange. It will be interesting to see how all this plays out, but it does not look overly promising for the time being.  They may just raise enough money to get things started, though.