Turkish central bank taps local tech firms for digital currency R&D
The Central Bank of the Republic of Turkey (CBRT) continues to research the potential benefits of introducing a digital Turkish lira. As part of the Digital Turkish Lira Collaboration Platform, the CBRT has signed of memoranda of understanding with three domestic research and technology companies. With these firms, the CBRT will develop a prototype “Digital Turkish Lira Network” and run limited closed-circuit pilot tests. Based on the results of those tests, the CBRT will unveil advanced phases of the pilot study that will reflect a broader participation. The CBRT has made no final decision regarding the issuance of the digital Turkish lira.
Reserve Bank of Australia posts CBDC job position
The Reserve Bank of Australia has posted a job advertisement for multiple positions within its new central bank digital currency (CBDC) research team. The cross-disciplinary team is researching “whether there is a case for a CBDC in Australia, and if so, how it might be designed and what benefits and other implications it would have.” But before all of you CBDC experts get too excited, it’s only open to Australian residents, so good luck filling those positions!
Solana crashes, SOL prices tumble as network scrambles to restart
Solana’s blockchain network went down on September 14, after large increase in transaction load to 400,000 per second overwhelmed the network, creating a denial-of-service that caused the network to start forking. Shortly thereafter, Solana’s validator community opted to restart the network, providing the rest of the community with instructions on how to do this via its Twitter feed and its Discord channel. The network restart was successful and supporting systems were up and running early the next day. Solana is a top-ten crypto-asset by market capitalization (currently #7 at about $47 billion.)
Tether says it doesn’t hold any commercial paper issued by Evergrande
USDT stablecoin issuer Tether reportedly said that it doesn’t hold any commercial paper or other debt or securities issued by the embattled Chinese real estate giant Evergrande. In China, there are serious concerns about Evergrande, which has run up a $300 billion debt and is struggling to pay interest. If the company were to collapse, it would have a huge impact on the financial system.
DTCC to begin development of DLT-based settlement system
The Depository Trust and Clearing Corporation (DTCC) is to move into the development phase of a prototype settlement platform (“Project Ion”) based on distributed ledger technology (DLT) that could act as the precursor to a US move to a same day settlement cycle. With six months of testing of the proof of concept now complete, DTCC says it has the quantitative data and qualitative feedback to build out a production-ready workflow and a roadmap for future full industry integration and adoption. The first phase, anticipated to be launched in Q1 2022, will support bilateral deliver order transactions that will be initiated by pilot participants through client nodes hosted by DTCC. Once launched, the transactions will be processed through the Project Ion platform and then passed to DTC’s existing systems for settlement processing.
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