The struggles associated with turning Bitcoin into El Salvador’s legal tender has not been easy. There’s a general state of uncertainty in the nation with street protests, arrests of critics by police with no charge, and reprimands from international bodies.
These difficult issues have thwarted the setting within the last 90 days from the time President Nayib Bukele laid down a path for the country.
Currently, as Bitcoin has become El Salvador’s official legal tender, the few hours of life’s experimentation remain unpleasant. To begin with, the market posed an indifferent reaction to its launch.
According to the president’s recent announcement, he has bought about 200 Bitcoin worth about $10 million. Also, he revealed that the country now has acquired for its reserve about 400 Bitcoin. These purchases occurred when the digital asset was above $50,000 per token, surging towards $53,000.
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One can say that the purchases were created out of excited enthusiasm. However, BTC dipped by over 10% just a few hours after the purchase by El Salvador’s government move. The cryptocurrency swept off some million dollars from the country to showcase its volatility.
In his response, Bukele said he purchased more than 150 Bitcoin during the dip. This has brought the country’s total possession up to 550 BTC. However, he didn’t reveal the price of the latest purchase.
Unavailability Of Country’s Official Bitcoin Wallet
Besides the market price movement for the day, El Salvador’s kick-off day with Bitcoin as its legal tender has some dents. There are still some technical difficulties that the country has to face.
The Chivo Wallet, the government’s official Bitcoin wallet, is not available on the official Android app store. Unfortunately, this means that anyone seeking it will go through third-party stores that operate with low, transparent security policies.
The government is directing the citizens to use Huawei’s App Gallery to circumvent the situation.
However, Apple has earlier released a link on iOS for Chivo Wallet. As a result, people who used third parties to download the wallet now have an unpleasant situation on hand. They just discovered that the wallet is no longer functioning.
According to president Bukele, the wallet’s development team has decided to halt the wallet’s operation. This move enables them to update the servers as they anticipate a heavy workload in the future.
From an official statement, Bukele explained that people would receive error messages if they tried to input data on the wallet at the moment. He said the capacity of the servers is being upgraded, which accounts for why the system is currently offline. He mentioned that even though the problem is quite simple, it can only be rectified as an offline system.
Despite the price breakdown, BTC is up by 2% | Source: BTCUSD on TradingView.com
At the moment, citizens can utilize any Bitcoin wallet they prefer. However, it will deny them eligibility for the government’s $30 BTC gift. Moreover, the offering is only available for Chivo users.
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Local reports revealed that those who got the $30 Bitcoin gift couldn’t swap it for USD. The Chivo Wallet team released some statements to Factum, a local news outlet. The team said that the funds from the government’s gift could only be used in affiliated markets.
Featured image from Pixabay, chart from TradingView.com