El Salvador's Bitcoin Adoption vs Banking: Did Chivo make a difference?
El Salvador made history on the 7th of September, 2021, when it made Bitcoin (BTC) a legal tender. The idea behind the move was to “bank the bankless.” A large portion of El Salvador’s population does not have bank accounts. The Bitcoin experiment was an attempt to solve this problem. Popular Bitcoin analyst Willy Woo recently tweeted some numbers highlighting how El Salvador’s BTC adoption nearly matched its banking adoption . As per the data, of the total El Salvadoran population, 40% had downloaded the Chivo wallet (the state-sponsored wallet for Bitcoin transactions). However, by May 2022, only 20% continue to use it. This number is close to the 25% of the population that has a bank account. A majority of the people stopped using the Chivo wallet after receiving the $30 incentive. Moreover, many complained that the wallet was not very easy to use. El Salvador #Bitcoin adoption nearly matched its banking adoption in its first 8 months since launch...