El Salvador’s Economy Minister Says Bitcoin Accumulation Spree an ‘Important Project’ Despite IMF Deal: Report

A top El Salvador official reportedly says Bitcoin (BTC) purchases are continuing despite a loan agreement with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) that called for scaling them back.

According to a new report by Bloomberg, Maria Luisa Hayem, El Salvador’s economy minister, says the country’s decision to accumulate Bitcoin as a reserve asset is not ceasing.

“There’s a commitment of [El Salvador President Nayib] Bukele to keep accumulating assets as a way to do precisely that…

Bitcoin keeps being an important project. There is an asset accumulation that we’re seeing from the government perspective, from the private sector perspective.”

Questions over El Salvador’s Bitcoin buying have been raised ever since receiving $1.4 billion in funding from the Washington-based lender late last year in exchange for pledges that included shoring up its fiscal accounts and scaling back purchases of the flagship crypto asset.

However, the purchases do not seem to be running afoul of the loan terms.

Earlier this week, the IMF addressed a question from financial software company Ion Group asking how El Salvador is still accumulating BTC despite agreeing to stop making any more purchases as part of a loan agreement.

Rodrigo Valdes, the director of the IMF’s Western Hemisphere Department, said that despite recent Bitcoin purchases, the country is still working within its “performance criteria” set forth by the IMF.

“In terms of El Salvador, let me say that I can confirm that they continue to comply with their commitment of non-accumulation of Bitcoin by the overall fiscal sector, which is the performance criteria that we have.

But on top of that, I think this is very important for the discussion in El Salvador. The program of El Salvador is not about Bitcoin. It’s much more, much deeper in structural reforms, in terms of governance, in terms of transparency. There is a lot of progress there. And also, on fiscal. And authorities have been making a lot of progress implementing the reform.”

 

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