Yopaki CEO Francisco Chavarria on Targeting Every Mexican Bitcoin User

In 2021, Francisco Chavarria stood in the audience at Bitcoin 2021 and watched as Strike CEO Jack Mallers passionately delivered his now famous keynote speech

Company Name: Yopaki

Founders: Francisco Chavarria (CEO) and Carlos Chida (CTO)

Date Founded: March 2023

Location of Headquarters: Austin, TX

Number of Employees: Four full time; one part time

Website: https://www.yopaki.com/

Public or Private? Private

In 2021, Francisco Chavarria stood in the audience at Bitcoin 2021 and watched on as Strike CEO Jack Mallers passionately delivered his now famous keynote speech during which he revealed that El Salvador planned to make bitcoin legal tender.

That moment sparked something within Chavarria.

“It was unlike anything I’d experienced in my professional career,” Chavarria told Bitcoin Magazine.

“I knew I had to do something in the Bitcoin space after that. It was the seed,” he added.

Fast-forward ahead two years, and Chavarria found himself putting his career as a Software as a Service (SaaS) consultant on hold to draw up the blueprints for Yopaki, a neobank and investment app with a Bitcoin-focus, aimed at serving the people of his home country, Mexico. (Users outside of Mexico can also use Yopaki’s non-custodial Lighting wallet.)

Since then, he and his co-founder, Carlos Chida, have been hard at work bringing Yopaki to life, including taking part in Wolf’s Bitcoin Accelerator program in efforts to make Yopaki as cutting-edge and dynamic as possible.

But before getting to that part of the story, let’s start with the cultural origin of the platform’s name.

What’s In A Name?

“The name Yopaki comes from the ancient language Nahuatl, the language spoken by the Aztecs,” explained Chavarria.

“The Aztecs lived in the center region of what today is Mexico, and they're the ones responsible for some of the biggest pyramids in all of Latin America. The center of this historical place is called Teotihuacán, ‘the place of the gods.’”

“The name itself, if I were to translate it into English, most closely means “the pursuit of happiness.’”

Judging by the name alone, it’s clear that Chavarria views Yopaki as more than just another business endeavor — he wants it to have a profound impact on those who use it.

And he’ll need the app to have such an impact if he and his team are to succeed in their mission: to turn every Mexican into a Bitcoiner.

Bitcoin In The Mexican Context

When Bitcoin is brought up in the context of Latin America and other developing regions, it’s often referenced as a tool to “bank the unbanked.”

However, Mexico’s banking system is “quite advanced,” according to Chavarria.

“The infrastructure has been built for people to have access to banking,” he explained.

“It may not be the same banking that we have in the U.S. (where Chavarria currently resides), but, for example, in Mexico, there are stores like 7/11s called OXXOs, and they’re everywhere. Any person can walk into an OXXO with an ID, and within 20 minutes, they can walk out with a Visa card and an app,” he added.

“It’s not exactly a bank, but it provides access to payment rails,” he noted.

Chavarria went on to share that these Visa cards do charge high fees, though.

“They’re very predatory in that sense,” he said.

So, Yopaki provides its Mexican users with access to three different monetary accounts: a Mexican peso account, a U.S. dollar account and a (non-custodial) bitcoin Lightning wallet. Each of these accounts lets their users transact at lower rates than said Visa cards. (In 2025, Yopaki will also enable its Mexican users to buy stocks, ETFs and other securities, as well.)

By offering a bitcoin wallet alongside accounts for traditional currencies, Chavarria hopes to legitimize bitcoin in the eyes of its users. However, he also feels that Yopaki has some work to do as far as helping Mexicans to get comfortable using bitcoin, which is why he and his team are doing what they can to make the process enjoyable.

Making Bitcoin Fun With Lotería

A favorite pastime of the Mexican people is a game called lotería. It’s comparable to Bingo but with images instead of numbers.

Chavarria and the Yopaki team included it into the app with a Bitcoin slant — concepts and characters like the Lightning Network and Max Keiser appear in the Yopaki version of the game.

“When it comes to Mexico, people think tequila, tacos, mariachi, and lotería,” said Chavarria.

“There’s