White House Crypto Chief Bo Hines Met With El Salvador’s Bukele to Discuss Bitcoin

El Salvador and the United States are looking to ramp up their crypto partnership.

Bo Hines, the executive director of the White House’s Presidential Council of Advisers for Digital Assets, met with Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele on Wednesday.

“The aspiring Bitcoin Superpower came to meet with the OG Bitcoin Country to discuss areas of mutual interest and possible collaboration relating to bitcoin, stablecoins and digital assets,” Stacy Herbert, director of El Salvador’s Bitcoin Office, told CoinDesk.

“Over the coming months, I believe we will see some extraordinary things happen for both partners as a result of this meeting,” she added, without elaborating further.

Hines is an important player in Washington when it comes to crypto policy, working alongside David Sacks, who chairs the crypto council and took on the role of AI and crypto czar.

The two countries have gotten closer since U.S. President Donald Trump’s inauguration in January. Bukele was welcomed by Trump at the White House in April, where they discussed security agreements. El Salvador has agreed to take custody of some of the illegal immigrants deported by the U.S. in the country’s maximum security mega-prison, CECOT, built in 2022 as part of the government’s crackdown on violent gangs.

El Salvador’s crypto regulation agency, the National Commission of Digital Assets (CNAD), has also already met with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) for the purpose of establishing a cross-border regulatory sandbox. The idea, according to CNAD President Juan Carlos Reyes, is for the U.S. to take advantage of El Salvador’s experience in regulating digital assets to evaluate streamlined regulatory approaches for its own framework.