Venezuelan opposition leader María Corina Machado has been awarded to the Nobel Peace Prize 2025, which is recognized for what the Norwegian Nobel Committee called her “tireless work promoting democratic rights to the people of Venezuela.”
But for many in the Bitcoin community, the victory carries a different layer of meaning – because Machado is not just a democracy activist. She is also one of a few (but growing) global political figures that openly embraced Bitcoin as a tool for resistance to authoritarianism.
The Nobel Committee described Machado, 58, as “a woman who keeps the flame of democracy going in the middle of a growing darkness.”
It is a description that not only fits her fight against the current regime, but her greater vision of how technology – and decentralized money – can strengthen citizens when governments fail them.
“I’m in shock,” Machado said after the announcement. “I’m just a person. I definitely don’t deserve this.”
“I dedicate this award to the suffering people in Venezuela and to President Trump for his decisive support of our cause,” she wrote at X.
A recognition for courage – and to become
Machado’s political history is one of Persistensen threatened. Apart from driving in last year’s presidential election – as international observers widely dismissed as a rig – she was forced to hide but refused to leave Venezuela.
The Nobel Committee praised her as “a key, unifying figure in a brutal authoritarian state now suffering from a humanitarian and economic crisis.”
This crisis is something Machado has long tried to explain in global forums: Venezuela’s economic collapse, she claims, was not an accident, but a predictable result of economic oppression and state control of money.
And this is where her views cross directly with Bitcoin.
Machado: Bitcoin is a ‘lifeline’
In an interview that was first sent by Bitcoin Magazine Last year, Machado spoke in the long run about Venezuela’s economic collapse and the role Bitcoin has played in helping citizens survive it.
“The Venezuelan Bolívar has lost 14 zeros,” she said, remembering how inflation once hit 1.7 million percent. “This economic oppression is rooted in state-sponsored looting, theft, and uncontrolled money-printing-has destroyed our economy despite our huge oil wealth.”
For many Venezuelans, Bitcoin became the only alternative. It has enabled families to store value outside the collapsed Bolívar, receive transfers without confiscation and even finance their escape from the country.
Machado called Bitcoin a “lifeline” for Venezuelans, a way of bypassing government -controlled exchange rates. She suggested including Bitcoin in Venezuela’s future national reserves as the country is trying to regain its stolen wealth and rebuilding from the dictatorship.
Machado also suggested, including Bitcoin in Venezuela’s future national reserves as part of the country’s improvement after Dictatorship.
“We see Bitcoin as part of our national reserves and helps to rebuild what the dictatorship stole,” she said Bitcoin Magazine.
Machado’s emphasis on transparency repeats one of Bitcoin’s core principles – a public headbook that is undisturbing by design. It is an idea that resonates with freedom and justice.