Thirty two central bankers and 12 financial chiefs representing 44 nations will meet in El Salvador later today, per the nation’s President Nayib Bukele, who claimed that – among other things – the group will discuss bitcoin (BTC).
Developing economies around the world are thought to be closely monitoring events in El Salvador after the country gave BTC legal currency status in September last year. And, if Bukele’s claims are true, their economic leaders, including representatives from central banks and finance ministries, will get the chance to see how BTC is being used in the economy firsthand at a summit to be held later today (UTC time).
Little if anything is known about the meeting, which appears to have been kept under wraps by not only the Salvadoran authorities, but also the alleged participants. Cryptonews.com was unable to find any official news about official visits to El Salvador in media outlets from the respective nations, and the Salvadoran press also appears to be unaware of any such meeting.
In fact, almost all that is known about the meeting comes from tweets made by Bukele himself, who wrote that the financial chiefs “will meet in El Salvador to discuss financial inclusion, digital economy, banking the unbanked, the bitcoin rollout and its benefits in our country.”
A large number of Sub-Saharan African nations were among the nations Bukele claimed would be in attendance, including São Tomé and Príncipe, Angola, Ghana, Burundi, Namibia, Nigeria, Senegal, Uganda, Guinea, Eswatini, Kenya, The Gambia, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and Madagascar.
One notable absentee from this list is the Central African Republic, which has recently introduced its own BTC legal tender adoption law.
Northern African and Middle Eastern nations are also on Bukele’s list, including Egypt, Mauritania, and Jordan.
Bukele claimed that Haitian and Dominican Republic finance chiefs would also be present, as would Pakistan, Bangladesh, Armenia, and Nepal’s central banks.
A large number of Latin American representatives are also set to attend, including financiers from Costa Rica, Ecuador, and Honduras, with the Central Reserve Bank of El Salvador chairing the event.
The operators of the Bitcoin Beach Twitter account appear to have got wind of the event on Friday last week, and even goaded the International Monetary Fund with a sarcastic post claiming that the event was “probably nothing.”
However, its list varied considerably from Bukele’s own – most notably as it also made reference to India’s attendance.
The same account also followed up earlier today with a map – perhaps of attendees – that will likely cause further confusion.
This map appears to show almost the whole of Africa shaded orange (the unofficial color of BTC), as well as Argentina and Mexico. Even more dubious was the shading of China, which has stamped out most forms of crypto-related activity, as well as both Russia and Ukraine.
Bitcoin Beach calls itself the “little community that helped orange pill the world’s first bitcoin nation” – and comprises expats residing at a small beachside resort in El Salvador. This group worked with the locals in El Zonte – population 3,000 – on a project that eventually became an unofficial pilot for nationwide adoption, with vendors and small businesses adopting a BTC pay ecosystem back in 2020.