EL SALVADOR’S BITCOIN OFFICE SAYS THE STATE WILL RUN NO BITCOIN OR STABLECOIN WALLET — IT SAYS ALL STATE INVOLVEMENT ENDED WITH THE CHIVO SALE — THE IMF SAYS THE GOVERNMENT KEPT A MINORITY STAKE AND CUSTODY OF CUSTOMER ASSETS — THE RESERVE IS NEAR 7,790 BTC

El Salvador's National Bitcoin Office answered a Bloomberg report on September 29, 2026: "The Government of El Salvador has no plans to launch or operate any bitcoin, crypto or stablecoin wallet. With the recent sale of Chivo Wallet to a private operator, all state involvement has officially ended."

Bloomberg's story is paywalled. Coverage of it says the government was working with a Palo Alto startup, Modveon, on an app called Sivar for sending and holding digital dollars on Coinbase's Base network, with a flat $2 fee on remittances from the US. The denial rules out the state launching or running a wallet. It does not address the Modveon contract Bloomberg described.

The second sentence is the one to check. The IMF's September 3 statement on El Salvador's loan program, as reported by AFP, said majority ownership of Chivo went to a private operator "while a minority stake and custodial responsibilities for customer assets have been retained by the government." If that still holds, the state keeps custody of Chivo users' coins.

Meanwhile the reserve keeps growing by about one bitcoin a day, to roughly 7,790 BTC. The IMF says the additions are donations, not public money. A reserve is the state's business. A wallet whose keys the state holds is the user's problem. At the time of this writing, bitcoin was $84,019.