As the smallest and most densely populated of the seven Central American countries, it's hardly surprising that El Salvador packs a lot into its borders. With a verdant tropical interior, charming colonial towns and superb surfing on its coast, El Salvador is arguably a microcosm of wider Latin America. And considering many of the country's best assets – hiking, hills and coffee – stem from its fiery geology, it's easy to see why the country is known as the 'Land of Volcanoes'. The post 8 day trips from San Salvador in El Salvador appeared first on Atlas & Boots.
Cryptocurrency adoption has been on the rise in El Salvador in recent years, with the country becoming the first in the world to adopt Bitcoin (BTC) as a legal tender. This landmark decision has attracted the attention of the global cryptocurrency community and has sparked discussions on the potential benefits and challenges of widespread adoption. El Salvador’s controversial move with its cryptocurrency adoption would not have been possible if it was not due to President Nayib Bukele, who garnered international attention after announcing the Bitcoin adoption plan and passed it into law. The legislation required all businesses within the country to accept Bitcoin as a form of payment for goods and services. As a legal tender, Bitcoin now has the same status as traditional fiat currencies, ...
The year 2022 wasn’t the best one in terms of crypto reputation among regulators and policymakers. However, even amid the market breakdown and repetitive public attacks on the industry, some of the officials found the courage to embrace the innovation. Some of the names are not new, while others showed progress significant enough to include them in this listicle. The United Arab Emirates and El Salvador continued to push their crypto agenda and the United Kingdom showed great effort to lay the regulatory foundation, while Brazil and the Central African Republic legally recognized the cryptocurrencies. Brazil 2021 might have been a year of mass adoption in Brazil, but it was 2022 when the country finally got its own regulatory framework. Before leaving his office, Jair Bolsonaro, the ...
El Salvador, the first country to legalize Bitcoin (BTC), has been pushed down yet another spot in total crypto ATM installations as Australia records 216 ATMs stepping into the year 2023. As part of El Salvador’s drive to establish Bitcoin as a legal tender, President Nayib Bukele had decided to install over 200 crypto ATMs across the country. While this move made El Salvador the third largest crypto ATM hub at the time after the United States and Canada in September 2021, Spain and Australia overtook the Central American country’s ATM count in 2022. On October 2022, Cointelegraph reported that Spain became the third-largest crypto ATM hub after installing 215 crypto ATMs. However, Spain continued its installation drive and is home to 226 crypto ATMs at the time of writing. El Salvador’s ...
Amid the crypto market downturn, El Salvador finally made a decisive step to the realization of its ambitious “Bitcoin bonds” project. The Minister of the Economy, Maria Luisa Hayem Brevé, introduced a bill confirming the government’s plan to raise $1 billion and invest them into the construction of a “Bitcoin city.” A 33-page digital securities bill, dated Nov. 17, urges lawmakers to create a legal framework using the digital assets in public issuances by El Salvador. They should also consider all the requirements for this procedure and the obligations of issuers and asset providers. The “volcano bonds” or “Bitcoin bonds” were introduced by the government of Nayib Bukele back in 2021. The initial plan proposed issuing roughly $1 billion of those bonds and allocating the raised funds to th...
As the world’s first nation to adopt Bitcoin (BTC) as a legal tender in September 2021, El Salvador is going back to its BTC buying days after a pause for months amid bearish market conditions. El Salvador President Nayib Bukele announced on Nov.16 that the Central American nation will start purchasing BTC on a daily basis starting from Nov.17. The announcement comes nearly three months after the nation made its last BTC purchase in July 2022. We are buying one #Bitcoin every day starting tomorrow. — Nayib Bukele (@nayibbukele) November 17, 2022 El Salvador started buying BTC in September 2021, right after making it a legal tender. At the time, BTC was in the mid of a bull market and every purchase made by the nation looked lucrative as the price was hitting a new all-time high every other...
Switzerland’s southern city of Lugano and El Salvador have signed an economic cooperation agreement based on crypto and blockchain. According to an Oct. 28 announcement from Lugano, the two pro-crypto jurisdictions signed a memorandum of understanding on economic cooperation at the city’s Plan B event. Lugano Mayor Michele Foletti cited El Salvador adopting Bitcoin (BTC) as legal tender as part of the city’s interest in the agreement, which will allow the pro-crypto country to establish a physical government presence in an effort to “foster cooperation with educational and research institutions.” “The use of Bitcoin and Blockchain technology creates new opportunities for growth and investment that benefit our communities; it is a new alternative financial and exchange tool that fosters tra...
The European country of Spain is officially home to the third-largest network of Bitcoin (BTC) and cryptocurrency ATMs after the United States and Canada. Spain currently hosts 215 crypto ATMs, pushing El Salvador — wi 212 crypto ATMs — down to the fourth position after surpassing the country by 3 crypto ATMs. Data from CoinATMRadar confirms that Spain represents 0.6% of the global crypto ATM installations. Crypto ATM distribution by continents and countries. Source: CoinATMRadar Moreover, the revelation places Spain as the highest contributor to crypto ATMs in Europe, which represents 14.65% of total installations in the continent, followed by Switzerland (144 ATMs), Poland (142 ATMs) and Romania (135 ATMs). Crypto ATM installation growth in Spain. Source: CoinATMRadar In 2022 alone...
El Salvador, the Central American nation that adopted Bitcoin (BTC) as a legal tender in September last year, has delayed the launch of its billion-dollar Bitcoin bond again. The Bitcoin bond, also known as the “Volcanic bond” or Volcanic token, was first announced in November 2021 as a way to issue tokenized bonds and raise $1 billion in return from investors. The fundraiser will then be used to build a “Bitcoin City” and buy more BTC. The bond was set to be issued in the first quarter of 2022 but was postponed to September in the wake of unfavorable market conditions and geopolitical crises. However, earlier this week, Bitfinex and Tether chief technology officer Paolo Ardoino revealed that the Bitcoin bond will be delayed again to the end of the year. Ardoino, in...
El Salvador’s Bitcoin (BTC) bet has somewhat backfired, with the top cryptocurrency currently trading at a 70% discount from its top. At a time when the Latin American nation is struggling with its debt, Morgan Stanley has given a buy call for the battered eurobond. Simon Waever, global head of emerging-market sovereign credit strategy at Morgan Stanley, told investors in a Tuesday note that El Salvador’s bonds are overly punished by the market conditions, despite the country having better financial metrics than many of its peers, reported Bloomberg. The note to investors read: “Markets are clearly pricing in a high probability of the autarky scenario in which El Salvador defaults, but there is no restructuring.” Waever noted that a country’s debt shouldn’t trade lower than $0.437 on the d...
El Salvador introduced BTC as legal tender on September 7, 2021, when its market price was around $50,000. Ever since, Bukele’s government made significant returns on their initial BTC investments as Bitcoin rallied to its all-time high of $69,000, which was redirected to the country’s various infrastructure development initiatives. However, as tensions rise amid falling BTC prices, Bukele decided to share advice for fellow Bitcoin investors that may be concerned about the prolonged bear market. Nayib Bukele, the president who helped Bitcoin (BTC) gain legal tender status in El Salvador, addressed the rising concerns of investors as BTC began trading for under $20,000 for the first time in 18 months. I see that some people are worried or anxious about the #Bitcoin market price. My advice: ...
Panama’s President Laurentino Cortizo has partially vetoed Bill No. 697 dubbed the “crypto bill” saying it requires more work to better fit Panama’s financial regulations. President Cortizo previously warned in May he wouldn’t sign the bill unless it included additional Anti-Money Laundering rules after Panama’s National Assembly passed the crypto bill in late April 2022. Local media outlet La Prenda obtained a copy of the 32-page veto, reporting the President wrote it’s “imperative” the cryptocurrency laws conform to new regulations recommended by the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) outlining “fiscal transparency and prevention of money laundering”. President Cortizo has previously described the legislation as an “innovative law”, and indicated approval of certain aspects of the ...