El Salvador’s Bitcoin Bet: Finance Minister Is Still Confident

A year for El Salvador’s bet on Bitcoin is almost completed and bitcoin is already in the darkness of suffering a bear market.

However, the finance minister of the country is still confident over their best on bitcoin and looking forward to keeping the digital currency for issuing blockchain-technology powered bonds as he believes that bitcoin brought more investments and tourism to the country.

Bloomberg reported that the finance minister Alejandro Zelaya still thinks that bitcoin adoption brought financial services to a largely unbanked population of El Salvador.

Last year Bukele did a bet on Bitcoin and purchased 2,381 Bitcoins with public funds to make El Salvador the first country in the world to accept Bitcoin as legal tender in September 2021.

However, those Bitcoins are now worth 50% less than the actual price they bought them for. Showing a 50% loss in the country’s bet on Bitcoin.

IMF (International Monetary Fund) also urging El Salvador’s people to ditch bitcoin and start using the country’s official currency in hard cash as the country is in process of getting a $1.3 billion extended fund (loan) from IMF.

Looking at all of this and a survey by the U.S. National Bureau of Economic Research suggested that most of the consumers and businesses in El Salvador prefer to use hard cash and not bitcoin.

Opinion: This time the bitcoin plunge is sinking El Salvador to bankruptcy and their finance minister is seeing another side of the reality.