Thirty-two central bankers and 12 finance chiefs representing 44 nations will meet later today in El Salvador, according to the nation's president, Nayib Bukele, who said that - among other things - the group would discuss bitcoin (BTC) .
Developing economies around the world are believed to be closely monitoring developments in El Salvador after the country granted BTC legal currency status last September. And if Bukele's claims are true, their economic leaders, including representatives from central banks and finance ministries, will get the chance to see BTC being used in the economy first-hand at a summit later today (time UTC).
Little, if anything, is known about the meeting, which appears to be kept secret not only by the Salvadoran authorities but also by the alleged participants. Cryptonews.com was unable to find official news of official visits to El Salvador in media from the nations concerned, and the Salvadoran press also seems unaware of such a meeting.
In fact, almost everything known about the meeting comes from tweets made by Bukele himself, who wrote that the financial leaders “will meet in El Salvador to discuss financial inclusion, the digital economy, banking the unbanked, the launch of Bitcoin and the benefits of it in our country."
A large number of sub-Saharan African countries were among the nations Bukele claimed would attend, including Sao Tome and Principe, Angola, Ghana, Burundi, Namibia, Nigeria, Senegal, Uganda, Guinea, Eswatini, Kenya, Gambia, Democratic Republic of the Congo and Madagascar.
One notable absentee from this list is Central African Republic , which recently introduced its own law to accept BTC as legal tender.
North African and Middle Eastern countries are also on Bukele's list, including Egypt, Mauritania and Jordan.
Bukele said the finance chiefs of Haiti and the Dominican Republic will also attend, as will the central banks of Pakistan, Bangladesh, Armenia and Nepal.
A large number of Latin American representatives will also attend, including financiers from Costa Rica, Ecuador and Honduras, as Central Reserve Bank of El Salvador chaired the event.
It seems that the operators of the Bitcoin Beach Twitter account found out about the event on Friday last week and even pushed The International Monetary Fund with a sarcastic post claiming the event was "probably nothing."
However, his list differs significantly from Bukele's - most notably because it also mentions the presence of India.
The same account was followed up earlier today with a card – perhaps of those in attendance – which is likely to cause further confusion.
This map appears to show almost all of Africa colored in orange (BTC's unofficial color) as well as Argentina and Mexico. Even more questionable was the overshadowing of China, which has shut down most forms of cryptocurrency-related activity, as well as Russia and Ukraine.
Bitcoin Beach bills itself as "the small community that helped pop the orange pill for the world's first Bitcoin nation" - and features expats living in a small beach resort in El Salvador. This group worked with local residents in El Zonte – population 3,000 – on a project that eventually became an unofficial pilot for nationwide adoption, such as suppliers and small businesses accept BTC payment ecosystem as early as 2020 Mr.