Clearstream joins ECB DLT for wholesale central bank money settlement trials
Clearstream, Deutsche Börse Group’s post-trade business, joins the European Central Bank (ECB) trials and experiments, aimed at exploring the potential of distributed-ledger technology (DLT) for wholesale central bank money settlement. Clearstream aims to assess the feasibility of using DLT for wholesale transaction processing, using tokenized securities, including conducting euro-denominated issuance and delivery-versus-payment (DvP) transactions across different use-cases and payment models. Three solutions will be tested by the central banks of Germany (Trigger solution), France (wholesale central bank digital currency (CBDC)) and Italy (TIPS Hashlink). [Read more at Clearstream]
Macroeconomic modelling of CBDC: A critical review
The ECB’s Ulrich Bindseil co-authored a paper that argues that macroeconomic models of retail CBDC often start from an early CBDC narrative which is no longer in line with the one of central banks actually working on CBDC. These include not accounting for design features communicated by central banks, such as no-remuneration, quantity limits, access restrictions, and automated sweeping functionality linking CBDC wallets with commercial bank accounts. Also, they do not explain well enough the difference between CBDC and banknotes within their macro-economic models, apart from remuneration. [Read more at SSRN]
LCH gets regulatory approval to clear Bitcoin index derivatives
LCH SA has received the required regulatory approval from the French national competent authorities (ACPR, Banque de France and AMF) and European supervisory authorities (EMIR College, ESMA) to clear cash-settled Bitcoin index futures and options contracts. LCH SA will provide clearing services through its new dedicated service, LCH DigitalAssetClear, for these contracts traded on the UK FCA regulated digital asset derivatives trading venue, GFO-X. LCH DigitalAssetClear is underpinned by a segregated default fund, tailored risk management model and dedicated set of clearing rules. LCH SA plans to launch the clearing service later in 2024. [Read more at LCH]
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.
