Salvadoran man says rising Bitcoin prices enabled him to launch a BTC-powered taxi and car rental business.
Bitcoin (BTC) was utilized by a taxi driver in El Salvador to launch a car rental business and raise awareness of the coin’s acceptability as a form of payment.
Per AFP (via Mileno), Napoleon Osorio (39) used BTC adoption to go from unemployment to running his own firm in three years.
El Salvador Taxi Driver’s BTC Success Story
According to Osorio, who spoke with the news agency, his BitDriver taxi company employs twenty-one drivers. He also said he has made enough profit from BTC price rises “to buy four rental vehicles.”
Thank you @AFP for calling us rich! 😄
— Bitdriver (@bitdriver_sv) September 7, 2024
Jokes apart this is a great article about how we overcame hard times with #Bitcoin and a lot of work !@elisuademo you're the best! 👊https://t.co/PMX12vATVo
As the first country to recognize Bitcoin as legal tender, the business owner has also taken on the role of a Bitcoin evangelist.
According to him, his company is “the first taxi company” in El Salvador to accept Bitcoin. Additionally, he asserted that he “no longer struggles” to pay for his teenage children’s education thanks to his success with Bitcoin.
According to Osorio, the founder of the non-profit organization My First Bitcoin, John Dennehy, an American supporter of bitcoin, “encouraged him to accept payment in the cryptocurrency.”
Since then, My First Bitcoin (also known as Mi Primer Bitcoin in El Salvador) and the founder of BitDriver have partnered.
He seems to have reached new heights on this journey. Osorio recently posted a photo of himself sitting in the presidential office of El Salvador on Instagram.
The NGO is mainly active in El Salvador. It says that it carries out BTC “education drives.”
We've taught 35,000 students about #bitcoin.
— Mi Primer Bitcoin (@MyfirstBitcoin_) August 13, 2024
Learn how we plan to reach 100,000 students. 👇🏼
We've brought bitcoin to tens of thousands of students in El Salvador in less than three years. But this is just the beginning! 🇸🇻🌍
🔗 https://t.co/zhkyb5c1Ms
Help us with a… pic.twitter.com/ncAzfajGaf
Caveats Aplenty
The AFP report, like many other mainstream media pieces on the adoption of Bitcoin in El Salvador, was not without its disclaimers, though.
Director of the University Institute for Public Opinion Laura Andrade was quoted by the news agency as saying:
“From the beginning […] it was clear that [Bitcoin adoption] was […] an ill-advised measure that the population rejected.”
“While Osorio has grown relatively wealthy with Bitcoin,” the report’s author pointed out, a study conducted by the same body “showed that 88% of Salvadorans had yet to use it.”
The president of El Salvador, Nayib Bukele, who designed the country’s plans for adopting Bitcoin, has stated that the government has about $400 million worth of Bitcoin stored in offline (cold) wallets.
“We offered Bitcoin as an option. And those who chose to use it have benefited from [Bitcoin price] rises.”El Salvador President Nayib Bukele