Australia Overtakes El Salvador to Become 4th Largest Crypto ATM Hub

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El Salvador, the first country to legalize Bitcoin (BTC), lost another spot in the total number of crypto ATM installations as Australia records 216 ATMs entering the year 2023.

As part of El Salvador’s drive to establish Bitcoin as legal tender, President Nayib Bukele had decided to install over 200 crypto ATMs across the country. Although the move made El Salvador the third-largest crypto ATM center at the time after the United States and Canada in September 2021, Spain and Australia overtook the number of ATMs in Central American countries in 2022.

In October 2022, Cointelegraph reported that Spain had become the third largest crypto ATM hub after installing 215 crypto ATMs. However, Spain has continued its install drive and is home to 226 crypto ATMs at the time of writing. El Salvador’s position as the fourth largest crypto ATM center was short-lived as Australia stepped up its game over the following months.

In the last three months of 2022, Australia deployed 99 crypto ATMs, data from CoinATMRadar confirms. As of January 1, 2023, Australia had 219 active crypto ATMs, eclipsing El Salvador by 7 ATMs at the time of writing.

Australia accounts for 0.6% of global crypto ATM installations and, at this rate, is well positioned to take over Asian crypto ATM numbers, which stand at 312 ATMs. The total number of crypto ATMs worldwide is 38,602, of which 6,071 ATMs were installed in 2022 alone.

Related: Florida’s Best Prepared US State for Widespread Crypto Adoption: Research

Nigeria’s drive to force the adoption of a central bank internal digital currency (CBDC) eNaira has forced the government to limit cash withdrawals from ATMs to $225 (100,000 naira) per week.

Customers should be encouraged to use alternative channels (internet banking, mobile banking apps, USSD, cards/POS, eNaira, etc.) to conduct their banking transactions, noted Haruna Mustafa, the director of banking supervision, while announcing the reader.

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