Since El Salvador legalized bitcoin (BTC) as legal tender, President Nayib Bukele took to Twitter numerous times to announce various BTC acquisitions from the country. Nevertheless, ALAC El Salvador – a non-governmental anti-corruption office – was recently denied information from a state-owned development bank, BANDESAL, about El Salvador’s purchases and sales of bitcoin.
As a development bank of El Salvador, BANDESAL created a trust fund of USD 150 million to guarantee the convertibility to dollars of citizens and merchants. The request for disclosure of the acquisition of bitcoin by El Salvador was denied on the grounds of confidentiality.
ALAC El Salvador refuted the denial by highlighting that the BTC purchases were made with public funds. His official statement was translated:
“Confidentiality limits the possibility for citizens to access and receive information about the operations carried out with public funds by BANDESAL.”
In his statement, BANDESAL said that no information related to the Bitcoin Fund (FIDEBITCOIN) could be shared by the fund or its board of directors to safeguard national interests.
Publicly available information hints that El Salvador has purchased 2,301 BTC to date, the value of which has fallen in the past year from $103.9 million to around $45 million.
Adding to the pressure exerted by the country to meet its bitcoin purchases throughout the year, Spain took the place of El Salvador to become the third largest cryptocurrency ATM hub in the world.
El Salvador came in third place after installing 205 ATMs to support the country’s burgeoning bitcoin economy, giving it a network of 212 cryptocurrency ATMs. However, Spain recently registered 215 active ATMs, which represents 14.65% of European installations.
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