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Bitcoin Awareness Among El Salvador Citizens and Businesses Is Close to Zero: Krypital Group CEO

Tue, 07/13/2021 - 14:23
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Yuri Molchan
El Salvador's population has shown zero Bitcoin awareness, while Mexico and Brazil look more promising for BTC, Krypital Group CEO stated, here's why
Bitcoin Awareness Among El Salvador Citizens and Businesses Is Close to Zero: Krypital Group CEO
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After traveling to El Salvador—the country that recently adopted Bitcoin as legal tender—co-founder and CEO of Krypital Group, Maggie Wu, stated that the country is not prepared to adopt and use Bitcoin at all. This was reported by Chinese crypto journalist Colin Wu.

Maggie Wu believes that Mexico and Brazil are much more promising in terms of adopting the world's flagship cryptocurrency as an official means of exchange.

Krypital Group is a major global venture company and blockchain incubator.

Guns, drugs and low Bitcoin awareness

In an interview, the Krypital CEO named several factors she believes are negative both for Bitcoin and for the general inflow of new businesses into El Salvador.

The first was the fact that nearly everyone is armed with pistols or carries submachine guns. Wu mentioned that the locals are very poor, and even if capital is more or less safe, in provincial towns there are gangsters, fire-fights, robberies, drug trafficking and similar nasty things.

She said that she did not bring any valuables with her and, specially for that trip, changed a new suitcase for an old one.

Maggie Wu also stated that the majority of the population of El Salvador has absolutely no idea what Bitcoin is and only a few companies accept it. Still, BTC can buy goods and services there.

Related
Top U.S. Diplomat Tells El Salvador’s President That Bitcoin Has to Be “Well-Regulated”

Bitcoin evangelists in El Salvador

In the country, there are Bitcoiners who are doing their best to promote BTC, and many people have BTC wallets.

But generally, the population is not aware of Bitcoin, despite the fact that it has been officially adopted.

There is also a place called "Bitcoin beach": a collection of cafes and restaurants where Bitcoin enthusiasts often get together to discuss further ways to integrate Bitcoin in the country and educate newbies about the king crypto.

So far, the infrastructure for Bitcoin adoption is poor in the country. It lacks basic software for mining and transactions. The government has made an official announcement about Bitcoin adoption, but the basis for it had not been prepared when Maggie Wu visited.

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About the author

Yuri is a crypto journalist interested in technology and technical innovations. He has been in crypto since 2017. Believes that blockchain and cryptocurrencies have a potential to transform the world in the future in many of its aspects. ‘Hodls’ major cryptocurrencies and has written for multiple crypto media outlets. 

His articles have been quoted by such crypto influencers as Tyler Winklevoss, John McAfee, CZ Binance, Max Keiser, etc.

Currently Yuri is a news writer at U.Today and can be contacted at yuri.molchan@u.today.