Bukele Optimistic About IMF Deal After Next Year's Election in El Salvador

El Salvador's President Nayib Bukele said Thursday that he is expecting to reach an agreement with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) after the country's general elections in 2024.

El Salvador's general elections, which will be held on Feb. 4, will elect the president, vice president, and all 60 deputies of the Legislative Assembly. Bukele noted that the agreement will help the country with a new financing program, adding that the negotiations with IMF have been "very productive," Reuters reported.

Last week, Rodrigo Valdes, Director of the IMF's Western Hemisphere Department, opened up about the meeting with Bukele and called it "a first step" toward the agreement. But he added that there were certain disagreements too.

Valdes didn't reveal the timeline as to when the deal is expected to be done at the time. But it is expected to happen somewhere in March or April.

He shared in September that the financial agency is working on some "technical issues" with El Salvador to ensure that the risk is minimized as the country is planning to adopt Bitcoin as legal tender.

"To some extent, they have a big opportunity that few countries have in the region: they have the governance and support to do what is needed to be done," Valdes said, without mentioning Bukele or his political party, Nuevas Ideas.

Bukele has been serving as El Salvador's president since June 2019. Considering the upcoming elections in the country, there are five more presidential candidates running for next year's elections aside from the current president.

Joel Sánchez from the Nationalist Republican Alliance party, Manuel Flores from Farabundo Martí National Liberation Front, Luis Parada from Nuestro Tiempo, Javier Renderos from Solidarity Force, and Marina Murillo from Salvadoran Patriotic Fraternity.

El Salvador is the smallest country in Latin America and the first country to adopt Bitcoin as legal tender alongside USD.