El Salvador Reserve Tops 7,800
El Salvador’s bitcoin reserve reached 7,807 coins on 16 October, worth about $640 million — up more than 1,700 coins since the IMF programme began in early 2025 with limits on public-sector bitcoin buying. Coverage summarises the IMF’s position as treating the additions as private donations rather than government purchases. Bukele’s administration continues to present daily buying as policy; the two accounts remain unreconciled.
Private donations: the polite fiction with a public audit trail
The reserve has grown by more than 1,700 coins since the IMF loan was meant to stop exactly that.
The Fund’s position, as coverage summarises it: those coins are private donations, not purchases with public money. No government resources in, no rule broken.
The government’s position: one bitcoin a day, policy since 2021, still advertised.
Nobody reconciles the two. Two weeks ago the Fund waived El Salvador’s past breach of the buying limit and released $138 million the same day. Bukele keeps talking up the stack. The Fund keeps signing off. Both get what they want by not looking too hard.
El Salvador publishes its reserve addresses, so anyone can watch the stack rise. If the Fund ever decides those coins came from public money, the evidence is already on the ledger, in plain view, waiting for the next review.
A polite fiction with a public audit trail. Those don’t usually last.
Related storylines
- El Salvador Bitcoin havenEl Salvador Bitcoin reserve accumulation and treasury expansion
1 source
- El Salvador’s Bitcoin reserve tops 7,800 coins despite IMF limits · cryptobriefing.com · T2