World Bank, an international financial institution that provides loans and grants to the governments of low- and middle-income countries, has shut down a request from El Salvador to assist the country in implementing bitcoin as legal tender into its national economy.
Image via Reuters
“While the government did approach us for assistance on bitcoin, this is not something the World Bank can support given the environmental and transparency shortcomings,” according to Reuters.
This month, El Salvador had sought technical assistance from the Bank as it seeks to use bitcoin as a parallel legal tender alongside the USD.
In 2001, the U.S. dollar became legal tender alongside the Salvadoran colón in El Salvador, and all formal accounting was done in USD. With the adoption of the USD, the Central America country lost control over monetary policy.
Salvadoran Finance Minister Alejandro Zelaya said the negotiations with the IMF had been successful, although the Fund said last week it saw “macroeconomic, financial and legal issues” with the country’s adoption of bitcoin.
El Salvador this month became the first country in the world to officially classify Bitcoin as legal currency and the country says it plans to use power from its volcanoes to mine BTC.
Read more:
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