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El Salvadorians are now swapping their USD for Bitcoin

While some Salvadorians were initially skeptical of the government’s move to make BTC a legal tender in the country, the recent rise in USD-to-Bitcoin conversions seems to suggest a change in investor sentiment.

Bitcoin ATM. El Salvador / Image by: Wikimedia Commons

Mon, 18 Oct 2021, 08:06 am UTC

A few months after El Salvador granted legal tender status to Bitcoin (BTC), mainstream adoption of the crypto appears to be taking off. In fact, an increasing number of Salvadorians are now exchanging their U.S. dollars and investing the proceeds in Bitcoin.

This was revealed by El Salvador President Nayib Bukele, citing data from the government-backed Bitcoin wallet Chivo. “People are inserting way more USD (to buy #BTC) than what they are withdrawing from the Chivo ATMs,” the President posted on Twitter.

Bukele also noted an explosive rise in Bitcoin remittances through the crypto wallet. “Today, we received 24,076 remittances, adding up to $3,069,761.05 (in one day),” he added.

While some Salvadorians were initially skeptical of the government’s move to make BTC a legal tender in the country, the recent rise in USD-to-Bitcoin conversions seems to suggest a change in investor sentiment, according to Cointelegraph.

The government has been going all out in its efforts to encourage citizens to use Bitcoin for their daily transactions. Aside from tax perks, the government has also offered fuel subsidies for local companies and citizens who use BTC to pay for their petrol.

Citizens can enjoy a discount of $0.20 per liter if they pay in BTC using the Chivo crypto wallet. To implement the fuel subsidy program, the government partnered with the country’s largest oil stations.

“The state company Chivo negotiated with the largest gas station companies in our country so that starting tomorrow, their stations will sell each gallon of fuel $ 0.20 cheaper, with Chivo wallet,” Bukele announced on Twitter on September 30. “This erases several increases in the international price of fuels.”

Since it adopted Bitcoin as a legal tender, El Salvador fast-tracked the deployment of over 200 crypto ATMs nationwide. The country now has the third-largest crypto ATM network in the world after the U.S. and Canada.

El Salvador even exceeded the U.K. in terms of crypto ATM count. The 205 recently installed crypto ATMs can facilitate Bitcoin-to-USD conversions and local BTC transactions.

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