SANTA TECLA, El Salvador — El Salvador continues to acquire Bitcoin for its strategic reserves, holding 6,367 Bitcoins with a current economic value of approximately $699.8 million—$109,904 per coin at today’s prices.
The National Bitcoin Office of El Salvador (ONBTC) published the country’s latest acquisition on their X social media account.
This purchase highlights the Bukele administration’s persistence in growing its Bitcoin strategy. Since 2021, when President Bukele declared Bitcoin legal tender, El Salvador has remained firmly tied to cryptocurrency.
The legalization of Bitcoin as a form of legal tender sparked global debates, challenging traditional views on Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies and highlighting their potential impact on the future of conventional financial systems.
In January 2025, legislators revised the Bitcoin law, removing the obligation for institutions and businesses to accept it as a form of payment. Some observers claim this ended its legal-tender status.
Ongoing Acquisition of Bitcoin
Despite the softened policy, the government continues to buy Bitcoin. Its reserves increase steadily, reinforcing Bukele’s long-standing strategy to diversify national assets with cryptocurrency holdings.
Currently, El Salvador holds 6,367.18 Bitcoins. The government buys at least one coin daily, sometimes more if market prices are favorable, while also expanding its geothermal-powered Bitcoin mining operations.
President Bukele publicly announced the initiative on November 16, 2022, affirming the government’s intent to continue purchasing Bitcoin daily until the digital asset becomes prohibitively expensive.
Still, the government remains secretive about its Bitcoin activity. No official figures on purchase costs, mining profits, or commissions have been publicly disclosed, keeping financial outcomes unclear.
In addition to purchasing Bitcoin, the Salvadoran government has taken steps to mine its own.
Shortly after making the cryptocurrency legal tender, the government initiated infrastructure projects to harness the country’s volcanic energy for mining operations.
It is unclear how many of these mining projects are today, as the Salvadoran government has not made this information public. However, news reports of these projects are available online, and two of them are Reuerts.com and Nasdaq.com.
El Salvador Bitcoin Holdings: Cold Wallet
El Salvador moved a significant portion of its holdings into a cold wallet. This storage solution keeps the assets offline and protected from potential cyberattacks.
In March 2024, President Bukele announced that a significant portion of Bitcoin reserves had been transferred into a cold wallet secured in a vault within El Salvador’s territory.
We’ve decided to transfer a big chunk of our Bitcoin to a cold wallet and store that cold wallet in a physical vault within our national territory. You can call it our first Bitcoin piggy bank. It’s not much, but it’s honest work. President Nayib Bukele.
El Salvador Bitcoin Holdings Future
El Salvador’s 2021 adoption of Bitcoin as legal tender represented a milestone globally. It redefined how governments could integrate cryptocurrency directly into their economies.
Yet, today its future looks uncertain. Most Salvadorans rarely use Bitcoin, and experts argue its legal-tender status has diminished, leaving the policy more symbolic than practical.
Despite these challenges, El Salvador continues accumulating Bitcoin. The experiment remains a global case study, one that could evolve if cryptocurrency becomes more stable and user-friendly in daily life.
