Bitcoin-friendly El Salvador wants to offer citizenship to investors

El Salvador's crypto-friendly president Nayib Bukele is proposing a series of reforms to draw even more investors to the country. After his Bitcoin City idea, he is now proposing to offer citizenship to foreign investors.

What if your cryptocurrency could bag you an extra passport and a new nationality? That's what could happen in El Salvador, it seems. Last September, El Salvador became the first country to recognize Bitcoin as a legal tender, at which point it joined the US dollar as the country's only legal currency. Since then, El Salvador has continued to accumulate the digital assets, and now holds 1,801 Bitcoin -- worth around $69 million at the current rate. To continue to build up Bitcoin and to allow the small Latin American country to prosper, president Nayib Bukele has come up with some more ideas. In a tweet, he said that he plans to introduce a series of 52 reforms in the near future, including offering citizenship in exchange for investment.

According to the country's leader -- often mocked and praised in equal measure on social networks -- the plan is to create a safe haven for investors and allow the country to gain greater financial independence for its citizens. At the same time, the International Monetary Fund continues to criticize the El Salvador government over its venture into the world of cryptocurrency. But if one thing's for sure, it's that if this reform comes to fruition, a bunch of investors might just give it a try.

© Agence France-Presse