Zimbabwe central bank to roll out gold-backed digital tokens for transactional purposes
The Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe (RBZ) has said it is now “at an advanced stage in preparations for the rolling out of gold-backed digital tokens (GBDTs) for transactional purposes.” The central bank said the rollout would see the gold tokens complement the U.S. dollar “in domestic transactions as retailers will be offered a safer, more convenient, and value-preserving medium of exchange.” This will be Phase II of the Zimbabwe Gold (ZiG) project. The RBZ reports that “GBDTs have proved to be an effective monetary policy instrument with strong potential to help restore normalcy to the domestic financial and capital markets within the short term.” GBDTs, fully backed by physical gold held at the RBZ, were introduced in May 2023. Meanwhile, the RBZ continues to pursue its roadmap for the introduction of a central bank digital currency (CBDC) as approved by the government in July 2022. It envisages the GBDT as the basis for the development of its CBDC “since ZiG in its current form and design exhibits most of the characteristics of a CBDC.”[Read more in the August 9, 2023 RBZ Mid-Term Monetary Policy Statement]
Ripple in talks with Reserve Bank of New Zealand for CBDC development on XRPL (PROBABLY FAKE NEWS)
There is some fake news spreading around (e.g., here, here and here) regarding Ripple collaborating with the Reserve Bank of New Zealand (RBNZ) on CBDCs using XRP Ledger. It was apparently sparked by a tweet from @edward_farina based on a December 2021 Ripple response to a September 2021 RBNZ Future of Money public consultation. If a determined XRP fan were to dig around responses to central bank CBDC consultations they would find many more such Ripple responses. They’re called “public consultations” for a reason. In this RBNZ case, there were over a hundred such responses, with many from the usual CBDC consultants and vendors (Accenture, eCurrency, Soramitsu, etc.), none of whom would describe themselves as “collaborating” or “working” with the central bank. To be clear, I have nothing against Ripple and XRP. I personally know many Ripple staff, and respect them and Ripple-related products greatly. My issue is with XRP pumpers who seem to know no limits to their spreading of misleading information.
*For those interested in intra-day updates, check out my searchable Diigo Fintech developments database, which is also a good place to go to query for past developments: https://www.diigo.com/user/kiffmeister/ART.
Kiffmeister’s central bank digital currency monthly monitor
Just a reminder that I produce a monthly digest of central bank digital currency (CBDC) developments exclusively for the official sector. So (only) if you work at a central bank, ministry of finance or international financial institution (e.g., the BIS, IMF, OECD, World Bank) and who would like to receive it by email on the first business day of every month, please DM me on LinkedIn or email me at chronicles@kiffmeister.com.
The Sovereign Official Digital Association (SODA) is a technology-agnostic firm offering advisory services at the intersection of central banking, digital finance and the web3 industry, aiming to make public digital money a reality. SODA believes institutions in the existing financial ecosystem should have access to the tools and resources they need to move from discussion to action. SODA offers ‘real life’ use cases to help test digital money and drive adoption as central banks and other public institutions explore the future of a more financially inclusive world powered by interoperable blockchain-based networks. SODA would love you to join us on this journey – please get in touch (chris@sodapublicmoney.org).
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