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September 7th marks the day that El Salvador officially introduces Bitcoin as legal tender alongside the US Dollar, with the worldwide crypto community buying $30 worth of bitcoin in support
Three months after the country's legislature enacted the Bitcoin Law, Bitcoin is formally legal tender in El Salvador. El Salvador's president, Nayib Bukele, stated in a tweet that a "learning curve" is to be expected with the "bitcoin process".
“We must break the paradigms of the past,” Bukele said. “El Salvador has the right to move toward the first world.”
A supermajority of El Salvador's legislature voted in favour of the measure on June 9, with 62 members voting in favour, 19 voting against, and three abstained from voting. The US dollar, which will now be on equal footing as Bitcoin, has been used in El Salvador since 2001.
The world's oldest crypto may now be used to pay for goods, services, and even taxes. This means that every economic actor has to accept bitcoin as a legal means to pay for services.
There has been some pushback to the law, with some calling it unconstitutional. The International Monetary Fund warned in June that El Salvador's move posed a variety of macroeconomic, financial and legal problems. JPMorgan has also warned that El Salvador's economy might be hit by headwinds, implying that its utility as a medium of exchange may be limited.
Coinciding with Salvadorans receiving the same amount preloaded onto a government-approved digital wallet, crypto enthusiasts are buying $30 worth of bitcoin to demonstrate their support. In fact, MicroStrategy CEO Michael Saylor posited a poll on Twitter - who would buy bitcoin to celebrate this event? From 89,280 votes, 83.7% of respondents indicated they would buy $30 worth of bitcoin.
It was verified in an interview on Tuesday by Presidential Legal Advisor, Javier Argueta, that it is obligatory to have an electronic wallet in order to receive payments in bitcoin, even if the money is not actually received as bitcoin but in dollars.
The First 200 BTC
El Salvador's President Nayib Bukele revealed on Twitter that his government had purchased 200 BTC on Monday, adding that their "brokers will be buying a lot more as the deadline approaches".
El Salvador has just bought it’s first 200 coins.
— Nayib Bukele 🇸🇻 (@nayibbukele) September 6, 2021
Our brokers will be buying a lot more as the deadline approaches.#BitcoinDay #BTC🇸🇻
When CoinDesk 20 went to press, bitcoin was trading at $51,883.07, up 1.84 percent over the preceding 24 hours.
People on Twitter and Reddit had been urging others to buy Bitcoins in celebration of El Salvador's proposal to declare it legal tender, as many investors are wagering that the announcement may raise Bitcoin's price.
Critic released
Computer specialist Mario Gomez, a vociferous critic of the bitcoin law in El Salvador, was released without charges hours after his arrest. Gómez was taken into custody by Montserrat police and transported to the Central Investigations Division, according to the local newspaper La Prensa Gráfica.
The police insisted to his lawyer, Otto Flores, that they seized his phone and computer to further investigate him for bank fraud. PNC noted that Gomez was accused of financial fraud related to false emails sent to users of the banking system that violated their accounts.
Me pidieron revisar la dirección de BTC que aparece en la presentación de Chivo Wallet que subieron a LinkedIn. La dirección es la misma que los hackers de Twitter usaron cuando robaron la cuenta a Elon Musk.
— mxgxw.α (@mxgxw_alpha) September 1, 2021
Un slide con una dirección con fondos ilícitos no ayuda a Chivo ehh 🤦♂️ pic.twitter.com/Icg05OFlSe
Gomez stated that an official presentation of Chivo Wallet on LinkedIn utilised the same address that Twitter hackers used when they hijacked Elon Musk's account, among other critiques of the Bukele government and the execution of the Bitcoin Law in El Salvador.
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