But they borrowed $1.4 billion from the IMF in December last year, so I feel that they used the loan money to buy bitcoins, even though they promised the IMF not to use public funds to buy bitcoins.
They never promised IMF on anything unrelated to that, IMF only warned them to be cautioned regarding any kind of investment like bitcoin that could be volatile, though there may be terms to the granting of the loan, but I don't think buying bitcoin is part of what could be termed as breach of law according to their agreement, this only shows how El-Salvador is been logical in their investments and IMF may only borrow them money, but not to dictate for them.
This is a mandatory agreement if El Salvador wants to borrow money from the IMF. They are not allowed to use public funds or loans to buy bitcoin and if they violate, they could have their aid cut off. And So far, there is no evidence that El Salvador is using borrowed money to buy bitcoin.
Also, it should be remembered that the loan package amounted to more than $1.4 billion but the IMF has only disbursed more than $113 million. The second aid package worth $120 million has not yet been approved, and the IMF is making more requests from El Salvador.
El Salvador depends on the IMF, they have enough power to dictate what El Salvador should and should not do.
How much help does this have for the El Salvadoran economy?
Check on the El-Salvador thread and know how bitcoin adoption has transformed them in many ways to what they are today, such that so many people who are into crypto are taking El-Salvador a learning ground for bitcoin because it's enabling for anything that has to do with this digital currency.
But the fact is that their economy is still in dire straits even though bitcoin has been adopted in the country for a long time.