Organizers in Paris have rescheduled a major local blockchain industry event due to the coronavirus outbreak.
According to an announcement on March 2, the Paris Blockchain Week Summit — initially meant to take place from March 31 to April 1 — is now expected to take place on Dec. 9–10.
The organizers rescheduled the event due to recent guidelines issued by the French government which prohibit large gatherings that could increase the scope and severity of the coronavirus outbreak.
A major industry event
The announcement stated that the conference will proceed as expected and “the venue, schedule and setup remain the same.” Furthermore, the organizers promised that more speakers will join the event’s list.
Speakers expected to participate in the event include Binance cryptocurrency exchange CEO and co-founder Changpeng Zhao, and French Economy, Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire, Parity Technologies blockchain firm Founder and CEO Jutta Steiner, Coinshares chief investment officer Meltem Demirors, Messari co-founder and CEO Ryan Selkis, and Brave Browser chief scientist Ben Livshits.
Coronavirus’ impact on the cryptocurrency industry
The coronavirus outbreak has a major impact on both traditional finance and the cryptocurrency industry. As Cointelegraph reported last month, a number of cryptocurrency-related conferences across Asia are being delayed in response to the regional spread of the virus. Furthermore, a Chinese cryptocurrency mining farm was forced to shut down due to the epidemic.
This week, United States-based cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase and blockchain firm Messari recommended their employees to work from home. Coinbase also released a plan to react to the coronavirus outbreak.
At the end of February, gold saw its biggest loss since 2014 when it succumbed to the sell-offs affecting traditional markets due to the ongoing epidemic.
Crypto analyst Naeem Aslam and the CEO of Tokenmetrics, Ian Balina, recently talked with Cointelegraph about the overall impact of the virus on the cryptocurrency industry.