With promises of safety and convenience and a hindrance to money laundering and the black market, central bank digital currency (CBDC) is coming to an economy near you. Central banks throughout the globalized world are increasing their investigation and investment into this cash-like system.
The growth of e-Money and e-Money Digital Wallets in South East Asia is providing central banks with the case studies and information they need to remove cash from their economies.
Since 2013, with the growth of cryptocurrency and mobile banking, CBDC has become a tangible reality. 80% of the world’s central banks have realized the importance of CBDC. The International Monetary Fund (IMF) has positively weighed into the debate of the centralized system. The IMF has described CBDC as a widely accessible digital form of fiat money that could be legal tender.
Further personal research has revealed rivalry between the Peoples Bank of China (PBoC) and the US Federal Reserve (USFR) that has been consistent since 2013. In 2021, the Bank of England (BoE), and HM Treasury (HMT) have created two taskforces investigating how personal engagement and technology will affect participants, publicly and privately. Consideration will be given towards digital and financial inclusion.
That such respected institutions are investing finances and resources into CBDC is telling. It is saying that they are moving from tradition to digitization. That they are being fluid. It recognizes that ‘traditional credit and debit cards are becoming obsolete as the face of banking advances, changes, develops.
The bricks-and-mortar that has stood as sentinels to the God of Mammon are becoming invisible, ghostlike in their pursuit and maintenance of digitization, instancy, and profit. The CBDC ‘experiment’ is just the beginning of the pervasive changes that emanate through a radically different world.
