Intelligence Squared

On Monday September 7th El Salvador became the first country to accept Bitcoin as legal tender. Businesses in the country will be obliged where possible to accept the digital coins as payment and citizens will be expected to download the government's new digital wallet app which gives away $30 in Bitcoin to every citizen. Bitcoin fans have been jumping for joy and believe the adoption of cryptocurrency in low income countries like El Salvador will provide banking services to the two billion people in the world who are unbanked. In El Salvador, 70 per cent of citizens are unbanked and roughly one quarter of the working population lives in the United States, from where they send remittance payments to their families back home. In the future, these payments could be made using Bitcoin, which could dramatically reduce cross-border fees and allow families to send cryptocurrency straight to the mobile phone of loved ones. But some security experts have their doubts. ‘Banking the unbanked’ may sound like a bright id