The president of El Salvador has expressed surprise after the bill received passage.
The US Senate on Wednesday voted in support of a bill to monitor Bitcoin adoption in El Salvador. Sen. James Risch introduced the bill. The goal of the bill was to limit the risk of the United States because of the adoption of bitcoin as legal tender in El Salvador.
Together with Senators Menendez and Cassidy, the trio worked on the bill tagged the ACES Act. Sen. Risch noted:
“As El Salvador has adopted Bitcoin as legal tender, it’s important we understand and mitigate potential risks to the US financial system.”
By the passage of the bill, the state department is mandated to work with the treasury to identify and limit all risks to the United States. Among other things, the bill mandates the Secretary of state to report back on the process followed by El Salvador to adopt Bitcoin. Reports are also expected on the impact on individuals and businesses of requiring tender of Bitcoin; and the flow of remittances from the United States to El Salvador.
Meanwhile, the president of El Salvador has expressed surprise after the bill received passage. He said:
“Never in my wildest dreams would I have thought that the US Government would be afraid of what we are doing here.”
El Salvador pursues Binance partnership to take Bitcoin adoption further
The El Salvador government adopted Bitcoin as legal tender in 2021, launching the Chivo wallet and offering incentives for the citizens to use Bitcoin. Likewise, the country also purchased Bitcoin ATMs to make it easy to exchange US dollars for the crypto asset. President Bukele also announced the country’s plan to raise $1 billion by issuing a Bitcoin bond.
However, the government postponed the launch of the Bitcoin bonds owing to the current volatility of Bitcoin. Now, the government is looking to Binance to help its bitcoin adoption. Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao is visiting El Salvador and plans to meet President Nayib Bukele on Thursday. The visit is an expression of Zhao’s confidence in Bukele’s decision to adopt Bitcoin as a legal tender.
Zhao noted that El Salvador had blazed the trail in adopting bitcoin as a legal tender. He also noted that Bukele’s bold bet on cryptocurrency would be remembered in the future as heroic.
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