Paxful's Ray Youssef: The Future of P2P Bitcoin Marketplaces Lies in Permissionless and Unstoppable Solutions
Summary:
Ray Youssef of Paxful believes that the future of peer-to-peer (P2P) Bitcoin marketplaces depends on their ability to become permissionless and unstoppable. Youssef, along with other developers, is working on CivKit, a P2P marketplace that aims to leverage Nostr and the Lightning network to enable censorship resistance and permissionless trading between peers. The project is expected to release an alpha version by the end of 2023. Youssef emphasizes the importance of P2P marketplaces in facilitating cross-border money transfers, particularly in light of potential closures and regulatory challenges faced by platforms like LocalBitcoins and Paxful.
According to Ray Youssef of Paxful, the success of peer-to-peer Bitcoin (P2P) marketplaces depends on their ability to become permissionless and unstoppable. Youssef, along with Nicolas Gregory and Antoine Riard, is working on CivKit, a P2P marketplace that aims to facilitate censorship-resistant and permissionless trading between peers using the Nostr protocol and the Lightning network. In an interview with Cointelegraph's Joe Hall, Youssef shared details about the project, which is expected to release an alpha version by the end of 2023. The system will rely on the Nostr protocol for its P2P order book and use the Bitcoin network as a source of truth for its market ranking paradigm. Trades will be locked under Bitcoin contracts to eliminate the need for third-party dispute arbitration, and market nodes will be incentivized through privacy-preserving service credentials backed by BTC payments. The whitepaper also outlines the goal of enabling global trade of various items, including fiat currencies and goods. Youssef emphasized that P2P marketplaces are more significant than they are perceived to be within the Bitcoin ecosystem. He mentioned the emergence of LocalBitcoins followed by Paxful and Binance's P2P marketplace, which he claims "stole" his idea. Despite the dominance of Binance's P2P marketplace, Youssef fears the potential closure of such platforms, leaving P2P users with no alternative for cross-border money transfers. He highlighted the closure of LocalBitcoins in February 2023 and the regulatory challenges that temporarily suspended Paxful's services in April 2023. Youssef described the current environment as "Operation Choke 2.0" where authorities aim to shut down crypto on-ramps and off-ramps. He stressed the need to build P2P marketplaces that are truly unstoppable and permissionless, as both Paxful and LocalBitcoins faced closure despite being registered in different jurisdictions.
Published At
8/25/2023 10:28:02 AM
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