El Salvador will use part of its $4 million in bitcoin profits to build a modern-looking pet hospital, its president Nayib Bukele explained Saturday in a series of tweets.
Bukele said the trust El Salvador created to help make Bitcoin legal tender now has a surplus due to the cryptocurrency gaining value. El Salvador’s lawmakers approved the $150 million fund before Bitcoin officially became legal currency on Sept. 7, and the country has also purchased a total of 700 bitcoins.
Bukele wrote a series of tweets on Oct. 9 explaining how the trust works, and why it has a surplus. The president said that the amount of funds in this trust, known as FIDEBITCOIN, is established in dollars by law. The trust’s balance sheet includes both dollars and bitcoin. Chivo, the state company that operates the trust, must settle that amount in dollars to El Salvador’s development bank Bandesal. Chivo is also the name of the commission-free wallet app that Salvadorans are using to send remittances and make digital payments to businesses, both in dollars and bitcoin.
