Tron founder Justin Sun's claim that St. Maarten is adopting Tron's TRX as a legal tender seems to be stretching the facts by a fair bit.
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A legislator on the tiny island nation of St. Maarten has promised to introduce a bill that would make Tron's TRX token legal tender.
That is, according to a Tron founder and seasoned promoter Justin Sun, "Another milestone for #TRON!" He said:
"St Maarten to adopt TRON as legal tender marks another achievement for our push on worldwide blockchain adoption."
Sun is an inveterate self-promoter, known widely for bidding $4.6 million in a charity auction to win a lunch with Berkshire Hathaway Chairman Warren Buffett, a strong opponent of crypto.
A billionaire, Sun stepped down from the Tron Foundation in late 2021, to become Grenada's ambassador to the World Trade Organization. He is also an "advisor" to the crypto exchange Huobi, which he is widely believed to have bought, and a supporter of Tron-based algorithmic stablecoin USDD.
But his late January tweet is getting more than a little ahead of the actual actions being taken on Dutch St. Maarten, which shares an island with the French "collective" — territory — of St. Martin. The two have a combined population of about 75,000.
According to the St. Martin News Network, Rolando Brison, an MP and leader of the People's Party in the 15-member legislature, has said he intends to introduce legislation to regulate cryptocurrencies.
"Allowing cryptocurrency to continue totally unregulated in St. Maarten is extremely risky, and we have to be proactive," Brison said. "Hence I use my right of initiative to bring this law with Tron Protocol at the forefront, with possibilities later for other blockchains to be incorporated."
He then suggested working with other neighbors like St. Kitts, which he said is "also working on their own legal tender legislation."
This seems a fair distance from El Salvador's embrace of Bitcoin as a legal tender on par with its main currency, the U.S. dollar. That has caused widespread opposition both inside the country and from outside organizations like the World Bank, to say nothing of the U.S.
Brison also pointed to neighboring Dominica's October decision to make Tron its national blockchain.
That nation announced plans to issue Dominica Coin (DMC), which a government release described as "a blockchain-based fan token to help promote Dominica's global fanfare for its natural heritage and tourism attractions."
Tron's TRX and a number of other Tron blockchain-based tokens might be usable to pay taxes and other public services, giving them status as "authorized digital currency and medium of exchange," and said businesses "may accept" them where the infrastructure permits.
