Although still skeptical, Argentina’s President Alberto Fernandez said he is cautiously putting his support behind bitcoin and isn’t ruling out launching a central bank digital currency.
During an interview with local media Caja Negra, aired by Filo.news, Fernandez said the concept of bitcoin and digital currencies is being debated on the world stage, and he admits, “there is caution because of how unfamiliar it is, and because it is hard to understand how this fortune materializes,” he said, referring to the roller coaster values of bitcoin over the months and years.
“Many people in the world have these concerns … But it is something to consider,” Fernandez said.
Ever since El Salvador adopted Bitcoin as a legal lender, crypto conversations have been heating up in Central and South America, particularly in Argentina because the digital currency can be used as an alternative avenue to the devaluation of the Argentine peso. It also offers “indirect exposure to the U.S. dollar,” according to decrypt.co.
See also: El Salvador Could Become First Country To Accept Bitcoin Like Cash
“They say the advantage is that the inflationary effect is largely nullified,” Fernandez told Caja Negra.
When Fernandez won the presidency from Mauricio Macri in 2019, he stepped into an economy ranked as the second most miserable in the world, behind South Africa, according to Bloomberg’s World Misery Index, which tracks inflation and unemployment forecasts for 60 economies worldwide.
Argentina keeps a short leash on currency exchange controls, which has, in turn, triggered a demand for foreign currency on the black market, per decrypt.co. In contrast, the U.S. dollar is legal tender in El Salvador alongside bitcoin.
See also: Adults In El Salvador Get $30 In Crypto Ahead Of Bitcoin Legalization
While President Fernandez expressed his support and caution for bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies, Argentina’s central bank president Miguel Pesce looks at bitcoin as something that is not an actual asset, and any profits gained aren’t stable.
Artificial intelligence (AI)-powered search engine Perplexity AI is planning on launching its own web browser.
The company said in a post on X on Monday (Feb. 24) that the browser, dubbed Comet, was “coming soon,” and invited people to sign up on a waitlist in a reply.
“Just like Perplexity reinvented search, we’re also reinventing the browser,” a Perplexity spokesperson told TechCrunch via email, the publication reported on Monday. “Stay tuned for updates.”
The company said in October that its search engine served over 100 million queries per week.
“Perplexity now serves over 100M queries every week,” Perplexity CEO Aravind Srinivas wrote in a post on X at the time. “Next stop: 100M+ queries every day.”
In December, Perplexity reportedly closed a $500 million funding round, tripling the startup’s valuation to $9 billion, according to a PYMNTS rerpot. The company’s backers included SoftBank, Nvidia and Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, according to the report. Perplexity had a valuation of $520 million early in 2024. During that summer, it was valued at $3 billion.
In November, the company introduced an AI-powered shopping assistant for U.S. consumers.
Through Buy With Pro, shoppers can research and purchase products, Perplexity said in a Nov. 18 blog post.
“It marks a big leap forward in how we serve our users — empowering seamless native actions right from an answer,” the company said in the post. “Shopping online just got 10x more easy and fun.”
The feature is only available to Perplexity Pro users in the U.S. It lets users check out on the company’s website or app for select products from select merchants, according to the post. Consumers who save their shipping and billing information on the portal can use a one-click checkout option.
Additionally, Perplexity unveiled a visual search tool called Snap to Shop, which helps consumers find an item by uploading a photo. Snap to Shop will display relevant products based on the photo, with no need for a product description or name, according to the post.
In other search engine news, a recent Bank of America Global Research report found that global daily visits to Google search are “stable” despite the surge in the number of artificial intelligence (AI)-powered chatbots like ChatGPT, Perplexity and Claude.
In January, the global average daily visits to Google were up 1% to 2.7 billion from December and down just 1% year over year, according to the report. The daily visits include desktop and mobile searches.
Google’s continued search engine dominance comes as AI chatbots continue to grow in popularity. Last month, visits to ChatGPT were up 4% month over month and 148% year over year to 128 million globally.