| A few points of interest for those that want to dig more: * This is an analysis of what was actually passed. It's a big deal as far as "legal tender" goes: https://twitter.com/robustus/status/1402456274340442113 For an discussion on what "legal tender" can mean, see: https://www.coindesk.com/el-salvador-bitcoin-legal-tender-ko... * For those that don't know, the US Dollar was El Salvador's previous only legal tender. For a list of some other countries that use USD or are pegged to USD: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_exchange_... - note of those, the Marshall Islands has previously announced plans for a CBDC (working w/ Algorand) and politicians in Ecuador has also brought up the possibility of introducing Bitcoin as legal tender. Many LatAm politicians (many that have been pegged to USD) have announced support for cryptocurrencies. Perhaps domino theory is back in play? https://twitter.com/balajis/status/1402279912623464458 * The plan for the merchant/end-user use case is apparently to use Strike https://strike.me/ , which is a custodial service built on the Lightning Network - see also https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210605005045/en/Str... (Technically it's opt-in and you can use any wallet, but I'll just leave this recent thread here as an example of why this isn't really an option: https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1376286470256873475.html ) * Anyway, that last detail is I believe is getting sidetracked from the main point, which is that as a (to my mind) clear direct consequence/reaction to current US monetary policy, and a shot across the bow of USD's reserve currency status. One doesn't have to look further than the numbers for foreign holding of US Treasury Bills to see how the wind has been blowing: https://ycharts.com/indicators/increase_in_foreign_holdings_... but of course, you can also listen to much smart people than me opine about this: https://youtu.be/ScAeHsXIUqI?t=528 (It appears that El Salvador plans hold $150mm USD in a fund that will slowly convert into BTC, assuming price volatility risk for merchants that want USD) |