El Salvador: first license for Crypto and Bitcoin
Yesterday, Bitfinex Securities announced that it received the first Bitcoin and Digital Asset license issued by the Central American state of El Salvador.
@bitfinex Securities receives El Salvador’s first Digital Asset License. Groundbreaking change in global finance with #cryptoand unlocks financial freedom and opportunity for all.
Read our blog and find out more 👇 pic.twitter.com/Eq6HdL25UI
— Bitfinex Securities (@BFXSecurities) 11 April 2023
In fact, El Salvador recently passed the new digital asset securities law, with the new regulations only coming into effect from the beginning of this year.
The first license issued in this regard is that of Bitfinex Securities, a company under the iFinex Group (Bitfinex, Tether), which will be responsible for issuing the Central American government’s Bitcoin Bonds.
Bitfinex Securities: El Salvador and the License for Bitcoin and Digital Assets
Bitfinex Securities thus became the first fully regulated digital asset exchange to receive a digital asset license in El Salvador.
The license was issued under the Digital Asset Securities Law (DASL), and will allow Bitfinex to issue tokenized securities in the Salvadoran market.
Through this, large and small companies, and authorities, will be able to raise capital in a regulated market with clear rules established by DASL by issuing tokenized securities. In addition, DASL also establishes rules for new types of tokenized securities alongside shares, such as interest-bearing assets and other investment products.
One of these securities will be El Salvador’s government-issued Bitcoin Bond, or Volcano Bond.
The goal of Bitfinex Securities is to become a leader in the innovative tokenized asset sector so that it can also offer small and medium-sized companies the opportunity to take advantage of global markets to raise capital.
The exchange will offer services that give access to new sources of funding, while at the same time giving investors access to a new set of innovative financial products.
In the official statement they write:
“We also remain committed to El Salvador and President Bukele’s vision for Bitcoin adoption. We will continue to stand behind El Salvador’s economic revolution by assisting educational efforts such as Mi Primer Bitcoin, Layer 2 technologies such as Lightning Network and RGB and as a technology provider for El Salvador’s long-awaited volcano token.
Tokenized assets: from the real world to the blockchain world
Tokenizing assets such as stocks or bonds provides benefits that simply did not exist before.
First, it makes the secondary market for shares available to companies that have until now been excluded from it. In fact, tokenizing shares makes it possible to easily offer tokens for sale on exchanges that specialize in digital assets, while bringing shares to traditional exchanges is still extremely difficult and expensive.
It also allows the purchase of fractional shares of digital assets, enabling small or very small savers to access digital asset markets.
It is a kind of fusion between the traditional financial market and the crypto market, where everything turns out to be a little easier and less expensive.
In fact, tokenized securities are potentially a financial revolution, because they represent a technological leap forward made possible by the use of new technologies such as blockchain.
In addition, thanks to regulations such as the Salvadoran DASL, they can be traded on regulated markets, instantly, securely and verifiably.
In addition, they also offer self-storage and P2P exchanges, on markets that are open 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. These are all advantages that traditional marketplaces simply do not offer.
El Salvador is making history with Bitcoin and cryptoassets
According to Bitfinex Securities, El Salvador is now the world’s first credible location for a disruptive new global tokenized security market.
It all began in September 2021, when the Central American state officially adopted Bitcoin as legal tender alongside the US dollar (El Salvador does not have its own currency).
This opened the door wide in the country for the mass adoption of blockchain technology, enabling the small nation to become Latin America’s main crypto hub.
It is clear that the strategy of the Bukele government is precisely to insist on this path, to attract not only capital, but especially innovative companies that are trying to build an innovative financial system based on new technologies.
So far, this strategy seems to be working, although it’s a long road made up of many small achievements that add up month after month.
Tokenized securities are potentially a worldwide market, and the fact that to date El Salvador still appears to be the only credible place in the world for this market, thanks to its innovative Digital Asset Securities Law, makes it a nation with a huge potential for development.
It is important not to forget that El Salvador is a poor country, with a GDP per capita that is still lower than, for example, in Iraq, Lebanon or Vietnam. The path taken by the Bukele government may perhaps bring the country out of this dire state which has very old and deep historical roots.
