Herbert defined that the adoption of bitcoin was key to altering the worldwide picture of El Salvador.
For the specialist, the US and the EU are going by way of regulatory paralysis relating to AI.
In a latest interview with businessman and popularizer Balaji Srinivasan, Stacy Herbert, director of the Nationwide Bitcoin Workplace of El Salvador, thought-about that the nation has supplied the regulatory readability that each bitcoin (BTC) and synthetic intelligence (AI) require to foster innovation and appeal to world expertise.
Herbert emphasised that this technique has not solely redefined El Salvador as a bitcoiner nation, but in addition positioned it as a good and secure atmosphere for the event of exponential applied sciences. The interview was carried out inside the framework of the Community State Convention in New York and was printed on December 28, 2025.
On this context, the specialist defined that the adoption of bitcoin as authorized tender reworked the worldwide picture of El Salvador instantly. “This was one of many largest rebrandings (model id redesign technique) in historical past, if not the largest: going from being generally known as ‘the murder capital of the world’ to being ‘the nation of bitcoin’ in a single day,” he mentioned.
Nevertheless, he confused that BTC adoption was not a easy advertising marketing campaign. He argued that, to realize the belief of the group, it was essential to place El Salvador as the brand new middle of “probably the most strong financial property on the earth”, people who perform as the bottom or “layer one” of the worldwide monetary system, that’s, gold, US Treasury bonds and Satoshi Nakamoto’s personal creation.
As well as, the director highlighted the relevance of its regulatory framework at a time when different international locations, similar to america through the Biden administration and below the administration of Gary Gensler, generated a local weather of uncertainty.
«Everybody was searching for regulatory readability. So I mentioned, ‘Let’s give them regulatory readability,'” Herbert mentioned. He commented that, following the rules that bitcoin is a commodity and the remainder of the cryptocurrencies securitiesEl Salvador created a regulatory framework that welcomes sector specialists. This, from his standpoint, attracted corporations like Tether to maneuver their headquarters there, a indisputable fact that was reported by CriptoNoticias.
It’s value noting {that a} commoditylike gold or oil, is taken into account an exchangeable commodity whose worth doesn’t rely on an expectation of income derived from the efforts of a 3rd social gathering. As an alternative, a safety includes an funding in an organization or challenge with the expectation of acquiring advantages primarily due to the administration or work of others.
A mannequin that seeks to draw technological innovation
The top of the Nationwide Bitcoin Workplace additionally referred to the convergence between BTC and synthetic intelligence, highlighting that each ecosystems share communities of buyers, engineers and miners that use knowledge facilities meant for AI and high-performance computing (HPC in English).
In truth, from his perspective, he maintained that The USA and the European Union are going by way of a situation of regulatory paralysis relating to AIwhich opens a chance for different international locations. «The EU is fining, regulating, stopping and prohibiting; “It is rather hostile to innovation,” he acknowledged.
In distinction, he believes that El Salvador acted rapidly to change into the primary nation with a whole regulatory framework for synthetic intelligence. “We now have an AI legislation and we’ve handed a robotic legislation, though we’re nonetheless writing the laws for the latter,” he mentioned, including that the laws are easy, with solely 13 pages, targeted on attracting innovation with out extreme paperwork.
In that sense, he dominated that these measures, mixed with tax incentives, search to draw digital nomads and startups. “We’re introducing 0% taxes for most of the industries that may arrange right here,” Herbert defined. Moreover, he commented that this technique is inspiring different international locations within the area, similar to Mexico, which now look to El Salvador—and never the European Union—as a reference to manage the expertise sector.
In any case, regardless of Herbert’s statements concerning the regulatory readability of the territory, at the moment Uncertainty persists about El Salvador’s actual coverage relating to bitcoin.
That is as a result of mortgage it obtained from the Worldwide Financial Fund (IMF) in 2025, because the multilateral group imposed restrictive circumstances on state adoption of BTC. These restricted the federal government from buying extra, issuing bonds in BTC and supporting its necessary use as authorized tender.
In keeping with its agreements, the IMF reported that the quantity of bitcoin in El Salvador stays unchanged. This case has generated confusion about whether or not the nation has remained trustworthy to its technique of shopping for each day because it claims to do or if, quite the opposite, it has tried to masks it.
