{"id":65174,"date":"2022-08-01T14:57:27","date_gmt":"2022-08-01T11:57:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/?p=65174"},"modified":"2025-09-06T18:31:41","modified_gmt":"2025-09-06T15:31:41","slug":"honduras-tourist-region-begins-accepting-bitcoin-payments","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/honduras-tourist-region-begins-accepting-bitcoin-payments\/","title":{"rendered":"Honduras&#8217; tourist region begins accepting Bitcoin payments"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The Santa Luc\u00eda municipality in Honduras has integrated payments in the first cryptocurrency to attract tourists from around the world. This is reported by <a href=\"https:\/\/www.reuters.com\/world\/americas\/honduras-launches-bitcoin-valley-tourist-town-santa-lucia-2022-07-29\/\">Reuters<\/a>.<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\">\n<p>&#8220;This will open up more opportunities and attract more people who want to use this currency,&#8221; said C\u00e9sar Andino, manager of the Los Robles mall.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>According to <a href=\"https:\/\/www.macrotrends.net\/countries\/HND\/honduras\/tourism-statistics\">Macrotrends<\/a>, in 2019 the country\u2019s tourism revenue was $556 million, and in 2020 it fell to $189 million. Now visitors to Santa Luc\u00eda will be able to pay for goods with Bitcoin, the US dollar, or the Honduran lempira.<\/p>\n<p>Initially, the Bitcoin Valley initiative was rolled out to 60 enterprises for pilot testing. In the future, more entrepreneurs and districts are planned to participate.<\/p>\n<p>The project was developed jointly by the Technological University of Honduras, the Santa Luc\u00eda municipality, the Coincaex cryptocurrency consortium, and Blockchain Honduras.<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\">\n<p>&#8220;To counter volatility, Bitcoin Valley will allow merchants to receive instant payments in the local currency,&#8221; explained Leonardo Paguada, founder of Blockchain Honduras.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>Earlier, the Italian fashion house <a href=\"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/news\/gucci-to-start-accepting-cryptocurrency-payments\">Gucci<\/a> and premium brand <a href=\"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/news\/balenciaga-to-accept-bitcoin-and-ethereum-in-u-s-stores\">Balenciaga<\/a> announced accepting Bitcoin payments in their US boutiques. A similar move was announced by one of the world\u2019s largest airlines, <a href=\"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/news\/emirates-airlines-announces-bitcoin-payments-and-nft-collection\">Emirates Airlines<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>In September 2021, the government of El Salvador <a href=\"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/news\/el-salvador-legalises-bitcoin-as-government-buys-550-btc\">legalized Bitcoin<\/a>. The country has 2,381 BTC on its balance sheet (about $55 million). Journalists estimate that the cryptocurrency <a href=\"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/news\/el-salvadors-unrealized-loss-from-bitcoin-reserves-hits-46-million-as-bitcoin-falls\">is worth approximately 50% less than the purchase price<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>According to the study, 84.8% of merchants <a href=\"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/news\/study-85-of-merchants-view-bitcoin-payments-as-a-means-to-attract-customers\">see Bitcoin payments as a means of attracting customers<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Follow ForkLog&#8217;s Bitcoin news on our <a href=\"\/\/telegram.me\/forklog\" target=\"\u201c_blank\u201d\" rel=\"\u201cnofollow\u201d noopener\">Telegram<\/a> \u2014 cryptocurrency news, rates and analysis.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Santa Luc\u00eda municipality in Honduras has integrated payments in the first cryptocurrency to attract tourists from around the world.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":65175,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"select":"1","news_style_id":"1","cryptorium_level":"","_short_excerpt_text":"Santa Luc\u00eda in Honduras begins accepting Bitcoin payments.","creation_source":"","_metatest_mainpost_news_update":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[1198,1199],"class_list":["post-65174","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news-and-analysis","tag-crypto-payments","tag-honduras"],"aioseo_notices":[],"amp_enabled":true,"views":"12","promo_type":"1","layout_type":"1","short_excerpt":"Santa Luc\u00eda in Honduras begins accepting Bitcoin payments.","is_update":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/65174","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=65174"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/65174\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":65176,"href":"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/65174\/revisions\/65176"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/65175"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=65174"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=65174"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=65174"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}