2 years ago
96 El Salvador became the first country to adopt Bitcoin (BTC) as a legal tender. The country has now relaunched its in-house Chivo wallet to address the current hiccups of Bitcoin transfers locally. With the latest AlphaPoint integration, the updated Chivo wallet is anticipated to execute instant low-fee BTC transactions while fixing issues related to scalability and stability.
While seeking to find a permanent solution for more than 4 million BTC users, the government of El Salvador focuses on Chivo wallet’s stability and uptime, scalability, and social impact. Within the first month of establishing Bitcoin as a legal tender, President Nayib Bukele stated that Chivo wallet onboarded 2.1 million Salvadorans that by the end of the year amasses 75% of the population.
Nonetheless, the mass adoption met with a lot of roadblocks, including missing funds and system issues. Seeking a permanent solution for at least 4 million Bitcoin users, the El Salvadoran government partnered with a white label infrastructure provider, AlphaPoint, focusing mainly on Chivo wallet’s uptime and stability, social impact, and scalability.
Based on the official statement, Chivo aims to expand its current consumer-faced use cases to the other day-to-day transactions such as simplifying payments of home utilities, taxes, and a lot of other daily transactions in Bitcoin:
“The project has aspirations to Chivo is also in the process of deploying 1,500 Bitcoin ATMs around the country to more readily serve the Salvadoran population.”
This integration with AlphaPoint will extend some support for point-of-sale systems, websites, and the Salvadoran government’s administrative console. Furthermore, the update features enhanced:
“Lightning integration for nearly instantaneous low-fee Bitcoin transactions via QR and Lightning addresses.”
AlphaPoint CEO and Co-founder Igor Telyatnikov stated:
“El Salvador and President Bukele are truly leading globally with this first major experiment in Bitcoin adoption at a country-wide level. We are honored to be involved in the process and provide the scalable and reliable solutions needed for this massive undertaking.”
In the pursuit of exploring greater use cases for Bitcoin, the El Salvador government is exploring the possibility of bitcoin loans with some enticing lower interest rates. El Salvador’s Director of Technology and Economy International Affairs, Mónica Taher, hosted a Facebook Live event to share an agenda of offering low-interest bitcoin loans to small and micro-businesses. While speaking to reporters, she stated:
“The Bitcoin small loans will provide access to digital money for the unbanked while helping them create a credit history. El Salvador’s economy will strengthen by empowering its small businesses.”
