Colombia’s government has decided to support a new app, board game and book with an investment of over $30,000. The app is aimed at teaching children and teenagers about cryptocurrency and stock market investing.
According to Cointelegraph Brazil, Henry Jean Velásquez suggested the game in response to a government call for new projects to promote financial literacy among young Colombians.
The game, called “B Coin: Learn to Invest in the Stock Market,” replicates retail trading in the following way, according to Velásquez:
“The user enters at once to invest and competes against two more players […] and has to interpret the movements of the stock market so as to buy and sell at the right time and earn money. S/he can buy stocks, cryptocurrencies, commodities and trade in the forex markets. Each asset has a specific trend that is simple to interpret.”
The government’s request for proposals is part of the Crea Digital Call 2021 framework, which was jointly announced by Colombia’s Ministry of Culture and Ministry of Science, Technology, and Innovation.
Velásquez will get 119 million pesos (approximately $31,000) as the winner and will be asked to deliver a reimagined version of his suggested game in November as a digital graphic novel for Windows and Android. B Coin will be distributed through prominent app stores starting in December.
According to Velásquez, as quoted in a Ministry of Science, Technology, and Innovation statement, “The project’s graphic and pedagogical features are being improved. We decided to turn it into a graphic novel so that it would be easier to teach after reaching a creative consensus.”
In addition to the updated edition, Velásquez plans to release a board game and a book by March 2022, bolstering the initiative even more.
According to studies undertaken by Velásquez’s organization Gameday, barely one percent of Colombian schools teach economic literacy.
His inspiration for B Coins is said to have come from a Colombian government decree from 2014, which mandated that financial and economic education be taught in Colombian schools so that children and young people can better grasp economics and the financial system’s dynamics.
As previously reported, several experts in the United States are concerned that American teenagers have gained an unfavorable opinion of trade as a result of the GameStop scandal.
This has prompted efforts to persuade youngsters to change their attitudes by pushing pro-stock market educational programs, such as virtual stock market experiences and a curriculum meant to elucidate the fundamentals of investment.
South Korean experts, on the other hand, are concerned that millennials’ growing reliance on speculative investments like stocks and crypto, which are funded by borrowing, is putting them in a debt trap.
They’ve noticed that many younger people see day trading as a “once-in-a-lifetime opportunity” to get out of financial limbo and help them make ends meet in the face of an insecure employment market, stagnant earnings, and excessively expensive real-estate prices.
