Asamblea Nacional, a Venezuelan lawmaking body, has declared that the issuance of petro cryptocurrency is “unconstitutional.”

President Nicolas Maduro announced plans to launch a cryptocurrency in late 2017. The pre-sale of petro kicked off on February 20 and is scheduled to run till March. Maduro has announced that the sale of the country’s Petro cryptocurrency sale has raised $735 million in the first day itself.

On Tuesday, Asamblea Nacional issued an official statement declaring that the issuance of petro is in violation of the country’s laws.

“The AN in full decided to approve an agreement in rejection of the financial mechanism and alert for potential investors and actors of the cryptocurrency market, considering the [petro] issuance unconstitutional and any other obligation on the part of the Venezuelan State that has as guarantees oil reserves or any other mineral,” it said (loosely translated).

Rafael Guzman, who chairs the body's economic and finance commission, said (as translated by CoinDesk):

"This deepens the crisis that we are living in. The PTR is another [example] of corruption, and we will come out of this crisis with measures that we have announced from this Parliament."

Deputy Francisco Sucre questioned the operation of issuing the PTR and said that no mechanism like the PTR with national assets can be guaranteed. He insisted on declaring the public offer of this mechanism null, considering it absolutely fraudulent.

"The situation in the country is becoming more jeopardized, nobody knows the origin of these investors, and nobody can invest a dollar in a guaranteed device with goods that come in free fall, like oil," Sucre said.