A survey in El Salvador indicates that its inhabitants are in “disagreement” with the acceptance of bitcoin as legal tender in the country.
Most Salvadorans reject bitcoin and prefer to continue using the dollar as legal tender. Two separate surveys were conducted by the Jesuit Central American University (UCA), and the newspaper La Prensa Gráfica reported on Thursday.
“Approximately seven out of 10 Salvadorans indicated that they disagree or strongly disagree” with bitcoin, the UCA said in a statement.
With a margin of error of 2.7%, the survey was conducted from August 13 to 20 through visits to the homes of 1,281 people nationwide.
“82.8% (of the population) have no or little confidence in bitcoin, and 95.9%, a very high value, almost unanimous, consider that the use of bitcoin should be voluntary,” declared the rector of the UCA, Andreu Oliva, during the presentation of the study.
Another poll carried out by the morning newspaper La Prensa Gráfica asked do you approve or disapprove that bitcoin is a legal tender in El Salvador ?: 65.7% disapprove a lot or something; 8.5% highly approve of it, and 14.4% somewhat agree of it. 11.5% did not respond.
What is the legalization of bitcoin in El Salvador?
In June, the Congress of El Salvador approved the law that will convert, as of September 7, bitcoin into a legal tender to boost the country’s economy, which has been dollarized for 20 years.
It is an initiative of President Nayib Bukele, whose management has high public approval.
The authorities will activate platforms to download the electronic wallet “Chivo”, created by the government to make commercial transactions and receive or make payments with bitcoin. It will come with the equivalent of $ 30 for consumption as an official stimulus.
According to Oliva, the population, of which 65.2% is not interested in downloading the Chivo wallet, disagrees that the government “gives” 30 dollars “on account of the public treasury” to users of the cryptocurrency.
Asked about the type of currency they will use, 71.2% of the population responded in the UCA survey that they are interested in using only dollars, 23.1% said they would use bitcoin and the dollar equally, 3, 7% said they would use the only bitcoin, and 2% did not respond.
“We found for the first time an important disagreement between the population and decisions that the Legislative Assembly and the president of the republic are taking,” said the rector.