El Salvador to Exempt Foreign Investors From Tax on Bitcoin Profits: Report

The country is attempting to encourage foreign investment, having adopted bitcoin as legal tender.

AccessTimeIconSep 13, 2021 at 9:33 a.m. UTC
Updated May 11, 2023 at 4:33 p.m. UTC
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El Salvador will exempt foreign investors from a tax on profits from bitcoin investments, a government adviser has said.

  • The Central American country, which last week became the first state to recognize bitcoin as legal tender, is attempting to encourage foreign investment, France24 reported Friday, citing the Agence France-Presse.
  • “If a person has assets in bitcoin and makes high profits, there will be no tax,” Javier Argueta, legal adviser to President Nayib Bukele, told AFP. “There will be no taxes to pay on either the capital increase or the income.”
  • Amid concerns about financial stability given the inherent volatility of bitcoin’s value, Argueta said that transactions would be halted temporarily if its value were ever to collapse.
  • Argueta added that the crypto wallet El Salvador is developing for use by its citizens will contain “relevant mechanisms” for traceability to mitigate risk around the use of bitcoin for illegal activity.

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Jamie Crawley

Jamie Crawley is a CoinDesk news reporter based in London.


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