El Salvador’s National Bitcoin Boss Argentina Was Orange – Cointelegraph Magazine

Although it takes more than 10 hours to fly from El Salvador to Argentina, Juan Carlos Reyes' recent flight may have been one of the most important of his life. It may also have global significance. moment.

Reyes, who was appointed president of El Salvador's newly created National Commission for Digital Assets (CNAD), returned from Buenos Aires after a high-level meeting with Argentina's securities regulator, the National Securities Commission.

Speaking exclusively to the magazine, he was diplomatic, albeit in an upbeat mood, about a possible collaboration between the two Bitcoin-friendly countries.

“El Salvador's multilateral projects have been prepared by the president; however, our two countries are talking about exciting opportunities and projects for the future. There is much in common between our institutions and our country's leaders, so I say stay tuned.”

Before El Salvador adopted Bitcoin as legal tender in September 2021, it should be noted that Argentina was the most receptive and interested in Bitcoin due to inflation that seemed to be everywhere in the country.

According to Statista, 2024 peso inflation is a record high of 250 percent, growing at 25 percent annually for the past seven years from 2017.

In the year In October 2011, under the presidency of Cristina Fernández de Kirchner, Argentina introduced strict currency controls, making it more difficult for citizens to obtain US dollars, in addition to the inflation of the Argentine peso.

Therefore, alternatives like Bitcoin were naturally attractive to Argentines who did not have easy access to dollars and wanted to protect their savings.

Interest in Bitcoin may increase further after the election victory of the extraordinary Javier Millay, who has called for radical measures to fix the country's economy in December 2023.

Reyes' visit to Argentina was probably the result of Miley's election victory and his meeting with Argentina's National Security Commission.

Argentina is a strong candidate for Bitcoinization, while El Salvador took the bull by the horns when it passed the famous Bitcoin Law in September 2021, accepting Bitcoin.

Reyes was an Orange in 2013.

In the year For CNAD President Reyes, who was introduced to Bitcoin in 2013, it was a mission he had since childhood.

“I have been passionate about computers ever since I touched one as a five-year-old. I learned basic programming before the age of 10 and have been involved in open source projects since the 1990s.

“When I learned about Bitcoin, I immediately fell in love with the technology and saw its potential, closely monitoring adoption and preaching about its transformative power to anyone who would listen.”

“Since 2018, I've started to take technology seriously and incorporate it into my professional life,” he says.

El Salvador has not historically been known for its progressive approach. When Reyes' parents immigrated to Canada in 1990, the country had been in a 30-year internal and external war.

There are an estimated 2.6 million Salvadorans in the diaspora worldwide — far outnumbering the country's 6.4 million residents — but the country's changing fortunes have brought back Reyes and many others.

I was very young when I left El Salvador. For me, the opportunity to return and participate in the vision of our President is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to contribute to building the country of my birth.

“I'm grateful that I grew up in Canada, where the culture is so tolerant of diversity that it was easy to maintain Salvadoran customs. Most of our families are very religious, so praying, going to church, and eating pupusas always played a big part in my childhood upbringing.

For those unfamiliar with Salvadoran cuisine, pupusas are fried cakes or flatbreads made from corn flour. They are the national dish of Salvador, best eaten with cheese.

Reyes continues to narrate his journey into crypto.

“I studied mining engineering and graduated with degrees in physics and mathematics as well as computer science. Later, as a challenge, I completed my Master's degree at Harvard and started companies and started consulting for government and private industries before coming home to help my countrymen with this new initiative.

El Salvador's Bitcoin Law: The Good and the Bad.

El Salvador has seen a huge upswing in its embrace of Bitcoin, with the nearly 6,000 Bitcoin stack in South America increasing in Bitcoin value, as well as an influx of “crypto tourists” coming to El Salvador to see things for themselves.

But the journey has not been smooth since El Salvador decided to accept Bitcoin as legal tender.

Earlier in 2024, Reuters reported that the International Monetary Fund recommended removing Bitcoin's legal tender status during negotiations for financial support, citing transparency and economic concerns.

Citizens of the country themselves stopped accepting Bitcoin. According to a recent study by the Bank of El Salvador, by 2023, 88% of Salvadorans do not use Bitcoin and their cryptocurrency payments have decreased.

There were other challenges as well. The state-run Bitcoin wallet Chivo has been hacked several times, with one exploit exposing the personal information of 5.1 million Salvadorans.

Reyes acknowledges that the mission of making El Salvador the world capital of real-world assets will not be easy. Pioneers always find arrows in their backs.

“[The] CNAD in 2010 It wasn't until 2023, and I've been in this position for just over six months. As a globally recognized digital asset hub, we are a pioneer in managing digital assets and unlocking untapped financial markets.

What is CNAD in El Salvador?

CNAD in 2010 It is a government agency founded in 2023 that oversees the digital asset landscape in El Salvador.

An autonomous body acts as a decentralized, independent body with separate legal status and independence.

“[The] CNAD is a single point of entry into the country of financial digital assets; All companies that trade in anything other than pure bitcoins as legal tender require the commission's permission. We are currently the only country in the world that has an independent body for this matter,” he says.

Reyes said the first phase was to create a fair and equitable regulatory framework aligned with international compliance standards and strong anti-money laundering requirements. Other challenges were to follow.

“The second challenge was creating the CNAD team. We looked for the best, younger, more experienced professionals in the industry and in a short period of time we created a dream team of 24 members, most of them under 40 years old.”

According to Reyes, this “dream team” collectively has more than 150 years of financial management experience and 70 years of direct banking supervision and control experience.

Reyes continues:

“The third challenge was to create a healthy and robust ecosystem with digital assets service providers (DASPs). This was not an easy task. As of May 2024, CNAD has received, evaluated and analyzed nearly 100 applications.”

“Many are still going through the regulatory process and are working back and forth with our team to comply with our regulatory requirements; however, a quarter of all applicants have been approved and are doing business in El Salvador and internationally,” says Reyes.

El Salvador issued its first permit three months after the country passed a digital asset extraction law in 2023. Applicants must be vetted and certified by CNAD to work in El Salvador.

Bitfinex Securities El Salvador – a newly established entity owned by the cryptocurrency exchange Bitfinex – has emerged as the first licensed DASP in the country.

The license was obtained on April 11, 2023, just three months after El Salvador passed the Digital Asset Mining Act on January 11, 2023.

Everyone knows about Bitcoin in El Salvador

Reyes admits that there are “many challenges and a technological learning curve” with each new project, but points to a positive trend in economic and educational aspects.

“Everybody in my country has heard of Bitcoin or knows something about digital finance, something that cannot be said about any other country in the world. We are seeing an increasing number of investors, not only foreigners, but wealthy Salvadorans who are homesick and looking for a better quality of life, who are interested in moving their business to El Salvador.

He stated that there are opportunities to merge and integrate traditional financial institutions with Bitcoin, saying that “Salvadorans can pay debts in banks with Bitcoin and all Salvadorans can use and receive Bitcoin with the government wallet and choose to have only one dollar. Balance if desired.”

He concluded that El Salvador is not only the world's most pro-Bitcoin country, but is also gathering information and experiences to help other countries follow suit.

“Yes, there are challenges, but from our journey, we have many lessons to share with other countries and actively share our knowledge. […] with other countries. We are very happy to do so.

Reyes' comments on his recent visit to Argentina include such advice, and time will tell whether Argentina's new president follows El Salvador's lead, but the whole world will be watching. These are exciting times.

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Monty Munford

Monty Munford writes regularly for the BBC, The Economist and CT AM and was a technology columnist for Forbes and the Telegraph. He also runs a growth and visibility consultancy and has appeared at over 200 events and conferences, interviewing the likes of Tim Draper, the late John McPhee, Sir Tim Berner-Lee, Steve Wozniak, Kim Kardashian, Guns N' Roses and many others. .

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