Kiffmeister’s #Fintech Daily Digest (20230312)

March 12, 2023March 12, 2023 ~ kiffmeister ~ Leave a comment

I’ve updated my tabulation of the 93 central banks that have recently issued, piloted, experimented with and/or researched retail central bank digital currency (CBDC). The updates since the last update are mainly minor, including fixing broken links. [Download the tabulation here]

Circle to ‘stand behind’ USDC, cover $3.3 billion shortfall held in Silicon Valley Bank

USDC stablecoin issuer Circle announced that it will “cover any shortfall” caused as a result of the $3.3 billion in its funds held by the collapsed Silicon Valley Bank (SVB). Circle said it is legally obliged to “stand behind” USDC and will cover any shortfall using corporate resources—and external capital if necessary. USDC is currently collateralized 77% ($32.4 billion) with short-term U.S. Treasury Bills and 23% ($9.7 billion) with commercial bank deposits ($5.4 billion with BNY Mellon, $3.3 billion at SVB, and $1 billion at Consumer Bank). Circle also maintains USDC transaction and settlement accounts with Signature Bank. [Read more at Decrypt]

The day before the California Department of Financial Protection and Innovation shut SVB down and appointed the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) as receiver (Thursday, March 9, 2023), Circle initiated transfers of the $3.3 billion held at SVB to other banks. Though these transfers remained unsettled when SVB was closed down (Friday, March 10), Circle believes that under FDIC policy, transfers initiated prior to a bank entering receivership should be processed normally. Hence, they are confident that the full $3.1 billion will be returned. Meanwhile, Coinbase says it will re-commence USDC:USD conversions when banks re-open (Monday, March 13). [Read more at Coinbase]

Interestingly, FDIC Chairman Gruenberg gave a speech on March 6 now seems quite prescient:

The current interest rate environment has had dramatic effects on the profitability and risk profile of banks’ funding and investment strategies. First, as a result of the higher interest rates, longer term maturity assets acquired by banks when interest rates were lower are now worth less than their face values. The result is that most banks have some amount of unrealized losses on securities. The total of these unrealized losses, including securities that are available for sale or held to maturity, was about $620 billion at yearend 2022. Unrealized losses on securities have meaningfully reduced the reported equity capital of the banking industry. The good news about this issue is that banks are generally in a strong financial condition, and have not been forced to realize losses by selling depreciated securities. On the other hand, unrealized losses weaken a bank’s future ability to meet unexpected liquidity needs. That is because the securities will generate less cash when sold than was originally anticipated, and because the sale often causes a reduction of regulatory capital.

Upcoming conferences, webinars and speaking engagements:

I’ll be providing an introduction to global CBDC developments (virtually) to a panel at the March 15 Digital Euro Association (DEA) Digital Money Academy with Ruslan Konurbayev National Bank of Kazakhstan) , and Péter Fáykiss (Maygar Nemzeti Bank). [Register here]
I’ll be on a “public finance and the digital future” panel at the March 23-25 Willamette College of Law “Our Money, Our Future” (Hybrid) Conference in Salem, Oregon on March 24. [Register here]
I’ll be moderating the “CBDCs, Stablecoins, Commercial Bank Money Tokens – What is the Future of Money?” panel discussion at the Digital Euro Association (DEA) Digital Euro Conference on March 31 in Frankfurt. [Register with this link and the DECKIFFMEISTER20 code and get a 20% discount]
I’ll be moderating a panel on “what happens when the lights go out…different schemes for offline functionality” at the in-person Digital Currency Conference (DCC) in Mexico City on May 18. [Register here]

Kiffmeister’s global 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 for any of you out there who work for a central bank, ministry of finance or international financial institution 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).

Satoshi Capital Advisors is a New York-based, global advisory firm that works with central banks, governments, and the private sector to architect, implement, and operate varying initiatives. Satoshi Capital Advisors’ central bank work revolves around CBDC architecture and implementation, providing advisory services from research phase through to growth phase. Utilizing a product-market fit and technology agnostic approach to CBDC architecture and implementation enables Satoshi Capital Advisors to build tailored solutions, bespoke to local financial system nuances. Satoshi Capital Advisors welcomes requests from central bank officials for virtual and in-person CBDC workshops. [Click here for more information]

WhisperCash offers the first fully offline digital currency platform that has the same properties as physical cash. It can perform secure consecutive offline payments without compromising on security, privacy or accessibility. WhisperCash allows direct person to person offline payments without any server infrastructure or internet connectivity. It comes in various form factors including the self-contained credit card-sized “Pro” that sports an eInk screen and capacitive keyboard, and lasts for two weeks between recharges assuming a few transactions per day. [Click here for more information]

Jurisdictions Where Retail CBDC Is Being Explored

March 12, 2023March 12, 2023 ~ kiffmeister ~ 13 Comments

There now 93 central banks that have recently issued, piloted, experimented with and/or researched retail central bank digital currency (#CBDC) not including two that started issuing retail CBDC and then shut the platforms down (Ecuador and Finland). The highlighted central banks indicate updates since the last time I posted the tabulation. If I’m missing anything, or you find mistakes in the tabulation, please let me know in the comments!

RCBDC-Explorer-Tabulation-portrait Download

Just a reminder that I produce a monthly digest of central bank digital currency (CBDC) developments exclusively for the official sector. So for any of you out there who work for a central bank, ministry of finance or international financial institution 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.

Kiffmeister’s #Fintech Daily Digest (20230311)

March 11, 2023 ~ kiffmeister ~ Leave a comment

USDC depegs as Circle confirms $3.3B stuck with Silicon Valley Bank

Circle’s USDC stablecoin, the second-largest stablecoin at $42 billion of market cap, depegged from the USD, trading as low as $0.88 on Coinbase this morning (March 11, 2023). This followed Circle’s announcement that $3.3 billion of USDC’s reserves were held at Silicon Valley Bank (SVB) which was shut down yesterday by the California Department of Financial Protection and Innovation and taken over by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC). Also, Coinbase announced that USDC redemptions would be temporarily suspended. [Read more at CoinDesk]

Silicon Valley Bank is a very American mess

An FT Alphaville analysis suggests that SVB exploited a regulatory loophole to run the egregiously mismatched balance sheet that ultimately led to its demise. Regulations put in place after the 2007-08 Great Financial Crisis meant to curb such mismatches (the liquidity coverage and net stable funding ratios) only apply to banks that rely on short-term wholesale funding, whereas SVB’s liabilities were mostly corporate customer deposits. (Bloomberg’s Matt Levine has also done a nice SVB post-mortem.) [Read more at FT Alphaville]

SEC denies VanEck spot BTC trust product, commissioners see double standard

The US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has denied another spot Bitcoin exchange-traded product proposal, this time a Bitcoin trust application from VanEck. There have been almost 20 such unsuccessful applications over the last six years. VanEck applied to launch a spot Bitcoin exchange-traded fund (ETF) in 2017 but withdrew it after facing resistance from the SEC. Then it filed applications in November 2021 and June 2022, both rejected the same reasons as all other similar rejections, over SEC concerns of manipulation in the underlying market. [Read more at CoinTelegraph]

Upcoming conferences, webinars and speaking engagements:

I’ll be providing an introduction to global CBDC developments (virtually) to a panel at the March 15 Digital Euro Association (DEA) Digital Money Academy with Ruslan Konurbayev National Bank of Kazakhstan) , and Péter Fáykiss (Maygar Nemzeti Bank). [Register here]
I’ll be on a “public finance and the digital future” panel at the March 23-25 Willamette College of Law “Our Money, Our Future” (Hybrid) Conference in Salem, Oregon on March 24. [Register here]
I’ll be moderating the “CBDCs, Stablecoins, Commercial Bank Money Tokens – What is the Future of Money?” panel discussion at the Digital Euro Association (DEA) Digital Euro Conference on March 31 in Frankfurt. [Register with this link and the DECKIFFMEISTER20 code and get a 20% discount]
I’ll be moderating a panel on “what happens when the lights go out…different schemes for offline functionality” at the in-person Digital Currency Conference (DCC) in Mexico City on May 18. [Register here]

Kiffmeister’s global central bank digital currency monthly monitor

Kiffmeister’s #Fintech Daily Digest (20230310)

March 10, 2023March 10, 2023 ~ kiffmeister ~ Leave a comment

Connecting digital islands: SWIFT CBDC sandbox project results report

SWIFT announced further progress on its experimental solution for interlinking central bank digital currencies (CBDCs), reporting that 18 central and commercial banks found “clear potential and value” in the API-based CBDC connector after a comprehensive review. SWIFT published the findings of the 12-week period of collaborative sandbox testing, in which almost 5,000 transactions were simulated between two different blockchain networks and with existing fiat-based payment systems. Sandbox participants included the Banque de France, the Deutsche Bundesbank, the Monetary Authority of Singapore, BNP Paribas, HSBC, Intesa Sanpaolo, NatWest, Royal Bank of Canada, SMBC, Société Générale, Standard Chartered and UBS. Over the coming months SWIFT will develop a beta version of the solution for payments that can be tested further by central banks. A second phase of sandbox testing will also be held, in which the SWIFT community can collaborate further with a focus on new use cases. [Read more at SWIFT]

Cash still plays an important role in the payment behavior of the Swiss population

The results of the 2023 Swiss Payment Monitor show that, although only 29% of daily payments are made in cash (17% in terms of value), cash still plays an important role in the payment behavior of the Swiss population, for small transactions (up to 20 francs).Cash usage differs by demographic characteristics, with 30–44-year-olds being the least likely to use cash, and over 60s and those on low incomes and with low levels of education being the most likely. Average amount of cash in wallets increased to CHF107 (vs CHF82 in 2022) and that at home to CHF831 (CHF524), possibly because of the energy crisis feared for the winter of 2022/23. [Read more at Cash Essentials]

Upcoming conferences, webinars and speaking engagements:

I’ll be on a “public finance and the digital future” panel at the March 23-25 Willamette College of Law “Our Money, Our Future” (Hybrid) Conference in Salem, Oregon on March 24. [Register here]
I’ll be moderating the “CBDCs, Stablecoins, Commercial Bank Money Tokens – What is the Future of Money?” panel discussion at the Digital Euro Association Digital Euro Conference on March 31 in Frankfurt. [Register here]
I’ll be moderating a panel on “what happens when the lights go out…different schemes for offline functionality” at the in-person Digital Currency Conference (DCC) in Mexico City on May 18. [Register here]

Kiffmeister’s global central bank digital currency monthly monitor

Kiffmeister’s #Fintech Daily Digest (20230309)

March 9, 2023March 9, 2023 ~ kiffmeister ~ Leave a comment

Crypto bank Silvergate announces ‘voluntary liquidation’

Silvergate Bank will “voluntarily liquidate” its assets and wind down operations. The bank was under fire after announcing it would have to delay filing its annual 10-K report due to questions from its independent auditors and accounting firm over its figures. “In light of recent industry and regulatory developments, Silvergate believes that an orderly wind down of Bank operations and a voluntary liquidation of the Bank is the best path forward. The Bank’s wind down and liquidation plan includes full repayment of all deposits.” [Read more at Silvergate]

CBDC as an untapped opportunity for the West African Economic and Monetary Union

IMF staff concluded that a central bank digital currency (CBDC) “could offer an untapped opportunity for promoting the development of the financial sector as well as financial inclusion in the West African Economic and Monetary Union (WAEMU).” However, the staff report warned that a CBDC presents significant challenges, and should not be viewed as a financial inclusion “silver bullet”. “In particular, it would be important to assess the extent to which private sector initiatives— particularly those related to e-money—could deliver similar results in terms of inclusion, efficiency, and safety, if adequately regulated. [Read more at the IMF]

Upcoming conferences, webinars and speaking engagements:

I’ll be on a “public finance and the digital future” panel at the March 23-25 Willamette College of Law “Our Money, Our Future” (Hybrid) Conference in Salem, Oregon on March 24. [Register here]
I’ll be moderating the “CBDCs, Stablecoins, Commercial Bank Money Tokens – What is the Future of Money?” panel discussion at the Digital Euro Association Digital Euro Conference on March 31 in Frankfurt. [Register here]
I’ll be moderating a panel on “what happens when the lights go out…different schemes for offline functionality” at the in-person Digital Currency Conference (DCC) in Mexico City on May 18. [Register here]

Kiffmeister’s global central bank digital currency monthly monitor

Kiffmeister’s #Fintech Daily Digest (20230308)

March 8, 2023 ~ kiffmeister ~ Leave a comment

ANZ to trial offline CBDC payments via smart cards

Australia’s ANZ is partnering with two universities to trial offline central bank digital currency (CBDC) payments via smart cards that can be loaded with funds and used like physical cash. Students will install secure apps on their smartphones to view their CBDC balances and use NFC functionality to load CBDC onto their smart cards. Students will use them to make purchases at on-campus merchants and make instant peer-to-peer payments in offline environments when unconnected to existing banking infrastructures. [Read more at the DFCRC]

The CBN consults Convexity on eNaira adoption

The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has reportedly partnered with Nigerian-based blockchain development firm Convexity to speed up the adoption of eNaira. Barbados-based Bitt is the CBN’s current eNaira platform provider, although rumors were flying in February 2023 that the CBN was looking for a new platform provider. From the headlines, one might suppose that Convexity’s role here is to replace Bitt’s, but a Techpoint article makes it seem like Convexity’s role is focused mainly on building use cases for the eNaira. [Read more at Techpoint]

Privacy enhancing technologies: payments and financial services in a digital society

The Bank of Japan (BoJ) published a paper on privacy-enhancing CBDC technologies, comparing methods for privacy-preservation, such as homomorphic encryption and zero-knowledge proofs (ZKPs), and discusses how important other central banks rank privacy within their CBDC projects. As part of its CBDC research, the BoJ will continue to research and study privacy protection related to digital currencies with a wide range of stakeholders. [Read more at the BoJ]

Upcoming conferences, webinars and speaking engagements:

I’ll be on a “public finance and the digital future” panel at the March 23-25 Willamette College of Law “Our Money, Our Future” (Hybrid) Conference in Salem, Oregon on March 24. [Register here]
I’ll be moderating the “CBDCs, Stablecoins, Commercial Bank Money Tokens – What is the Future of Money?” panel discussion at the Digital Euro Association Digital Euro Conference on March 31 in Frankfurt. [Register here]
I’ll be moderating a panel on “what happens when the lights go out…different schemes for offline functionality” at the in-person Digital Currency Conference (DCC) in Mexico City on May 18. [Register here]

Kiffmeister’s global central bank digital currency monthly monitor

Kiffmeister’s #Fintech Daily Digest (20230307)

March 7, 2023March 7, 2023 ~ kiffmeister ~ Leave a comment

Brazil announces CBDC proof-of-concept seeking to leverage financial services

Banco Central dos Brasil (BCB) announced the start of a (wholesale?) central bank digital currency (CBDC) proof-of-concept (PoC) project aimed at providing payment rails executed on distributed ledger technology (DLT) to support the provision of retail financial services, including the purchase and sale of tokenized government bonds, settled through tokenized bank deposits. The PoC is not aimed at leveraging digital payments, as this is already being done on a large scale with Pix, which was launched at the end of 2021 and has been widely adopted. [Read more at the BCB]

Compensation model for the digital euro

The European Central Bank (ECB) published a presentation on the digital euro compensation model. The digital euro is seen as a public good and should be free for basic use by private individuals, but there should be economic incentives for payment service providers (PSPs) to distribute the digital euro in order to generate network effects. PSPs will be allowed to charge merchants, as with cash and other payment methods today, and such fees could be determined by market forces. However, legislation might establish an expectation on merchant pricing considering the current levels for comparable retail payment solutions. [Read more at the ECB]

Alameda Research files suit against Grayscale over ‘self-imposed redemption ban’

Alameda Research, an affiliate debtor of FTX, which filed for bankruptcy in November, has filed suit against Grayscale Investments. The suit seeks to “unlock $9 billion or more in value for shareholders of the Grayscale Bitcoin and Ethereum Trusts and realize over a quarter billion dollars in asset value for the FTX debtors’ customers and creditors. The lawsuit claims that Grayscale charged over $1.3 billion in management fees in violation of trust agreements, and “contrived excuses” to prevent shareholders from redeeming their shares in what the statement described as a “self-imposed redemption ban.” As a result, the statement continued, the Trusts’ shares trade “at approximately a 50% discount to Net Asset Value.” [Read more at CoinTelegraph]

China’s WeChat integrates digital yuan into payment platform

WeChat has reportedly added China’s central bank digital currency (CBDC) to some of its payment services, following rival Alipay in offering support for the digital yuan since December 2022. WeChat Pay now allows digital yuan payments on certain apps, such as ordering food from McDonald’s and paying bills. Direct CBDC transactions between WeChat users are expected to follow. [Read more at Forkast]

Upcoming conferences, webinars and speaking engagements:

I’ll be on a “public finance and the digital future” panel at the March 23-25 Willamette College of Law “Our Money, Our Future” (Hybrid) Conference in Salem, Oregon on March 24. [Register here]
I’ll be moderating the “CBDCs, Stablecoins, Commercial Bank Money Tokens – What is the Future of Money?” panel discussion at the Digital Euro Association Digital Euro Conference on March 31 in Frankfurt. [Register here]
I’ll be moderating a panel on “what happens when the lights go out…different schemes for offline functionality” at the in-person Digital Currency Conference (DCC) in Mexico City on May 18. [Register here]

Kiffmeister’s global central bank digital currency monthly monitor

Kiffmeister’s #Fintech Daily Digest (20230306)

March 6, 2023March 6, 2023 ~ kiffmeister ~ Leave a comment

Project Icebreaker: breaking new paths in cross-border retail CBDC payments

The Bank for International Settlements (BIS) Innovation Hub and the and the central banks of Israel, Norway and Sweden, concluded Project Icebreaker, which studied the potential benefits and challenges of using retail central bank digital currencies (CBDCs) for cross-border payments. In the Icebreaker model, a cross-border transaction is broken up into two domestic payments, one in each domestic system, so the CBDC never leaves its own domestic system. Foreign exchange (FX) providers buy one currency in one system and sell the other currency in the other system. Settlement is via a coordinated payment-versus-payment (PvP) arrangement using hash time locked contracts (HTLC), going a long way towards eliminating counterparty risk in the FX transaction. FX providers submit FX rates to the Icebreaker hub, which selects the best rate to be presented to the payer for each payment request. The number of connections between retail CBDC systems are kept to a minimum by the hub-and-spoke approach. The Icebreaker hub only routes payment messages and does not act upon them. The only information it acts upon is the data from FX providers, which are used when identifying and selecting the best FX rates for the payer. [Read more at the BIS]

Iran completes pre-pilot phase of central bank digital currency

Iran has reportedly completed preliminary research for the launch of a potential digital rial, including a pre-pilot development phase, according to the central bank’s Monetary and Banking Research Institute. However, this should be taken with a big “grain of salt” because there have already been two, apparently false, reports that pilot launches were imminent, e.g., in January 2022 and February 2023. I will be “demoting” the Iranian retail CBDC from “piloted/ launched” to “proof-of-concept” in my next retail CBDC update. [Read more at CoinTelegraph]

Crypto Exchange Bybit Suspends Dollar Payments via Bank Transfers

Crypto exchange Bybit is suspending USD bank transfers on March 10 due to service outages at its end-point processing partner.” It didn’t identify the partner, but it is speculated that it was Silvergate Bank. Silvergate discontinued the payments network that has served as a USD fiat transfer hub for the crypto industry, after the firm raised questions about its own viability. After March 10 customers can continue to buy crypto with credit cards. [Read more at Bybit]

Lemonade launches blockchain-based climate insurance in Kenya

Insurtech Lemonade has launched its blockchain- and stablecoin-based parametric climate risk insurance in Kenya’s Taita Taveta County. 6,000 insurance policies were issued by the Lemonade Crypto Climate Coalition, constituted as a decentralized autonomous organization (DAO) on Avalanche, an eco-friendly proof-of-stake blockchain. Farmers sign on their feature phones on which they also pay their insurance premiums using stablecoins or local currencies to cover their entire crop against drought and flood. When the season is over, parametric weather results are gathered and payouts are automatically made to farmers in drought or flood affected areas, with no claims filing process. [Read more on Twitter]

Upcoming conferences, webinars and speaking engagements:

I’ll be providing a (probably virtual) update on global central bank digital currency (CBDC) developments at the Digital Euro Association Digital Euro Conference on March 31 in Frankfurt. [Register here]
I’ll be moderating a panel on “what happens when the lights go out…different schemes for offline functionality” at the in-person Digital Currency Conference (DCC) in Mexico City on May 18. [Register here]

Kiffmeister’s global central bank digital currency monthly monitor

Kiffmeister’s #Fintech Daily Digest (20230305)

March 5, 2023 ~ kiffmeister ~ Leave a comment

The future of machine money

The Digital Euro Association (DEA) published a paper on the the potential of stablecoins in the European internet-of-things (IoT) and machine-to-machine (M2M) economies. The paper examines the benefits and drawbacks of M2M payments, provides industry use cases that highlight the potential benefits of stablecoin-enabled IoT and M2M payments, and discusses the need for further guidance from regulators to spur M2M payment growth. [Read more at the DEA]

Stablecoins and the financing of the real economy

The Banque de France (BdF) published a paper on the impact of stablecoins on the financing of the real economy. The largest stablecoins manage their peg with the US dollar by holding safe short-term assets such as US dollar-denominated commercial paper (CP). The paper suggests that US CP issuers react to the increasing demand for stablecoins by issuing more CP. The authors exploit the fact that reserve asset policies vary across stablecoins and over time to confirm that the relationship between stablecoins and CP market is effectively due to the purchase of CP by stablecoin issuers. [Read more at the BdF]

Upcoming conferences, webinars and speaking engagements:

I’ll be providing a (probably virtual) update on global central bank digital currency (CBDC) developments at the Digital Euro Association Digital Euro Conference on March 31 in Frankfurt. [Register here]
I’ll be moderating a panel on “what happens when the lights go out…different schemes for offline functionality” at the in-person Digital Currency Conference (DCC) in Mexico City on May 18. [Register here]

Kiffmeister’s global central bank digital currency monthly monitor

Kiffmeister’s #Fintech Daily Digest (20230304)

March 4, 2023March 4, 2023 ~ kiffmeister ~ Leave a comment

Paths toward an acceptable US public digital currency

The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) published a paper that looks at some of the central bank digital currency (CBDC) design options that are being discussed and which would be good for privacy and accessibility. It argues, for a “digital bearer instrument in which money is stored on a device with no party keeping track of balances on a ledger [with] offline and peer-to-peer transactions enabled to the greatest extent feasible.” Also, it’s important that the CBDC be fully fungible and subject to the rules that apply to physical cash, and not the rules that apply to bank accounts. In addition, the software and hardware infrastructure behind a CBDC should be transparent and subject to external, independent audits (e.g., open source). [Read more at the ACLU and Rohan Grey’s summary here]

Notably, the ACLU position shares all of the key design recommendations of the CBDC Manifesto, which I urge everyone in the CBDC policy space to read and sign. [Read the Manifesto here]

Introduction of Norwegian central bank digital currency – necessary legislative amendments

Norges Bank, as part of the fourth phase of its CBDC, is assessing the legislative amendments that are expected to be required to introduce CBDC. Other parts of the fourth phase experimental testing of technical solutions in combination with further analysis of the need for and consequences if a CBDC is introduced. [Read more at the Norges Bank]

Trust bridges and money flows: a digital marketplace to improve cross-border payments

The IMF published a paper on the role of limited trust among counterparties in dysfunctional cross-border payment systems. Interoperability between different forms of money can thus be conceptualized as the network of trusted links necessary for transactions. Traditionally, across borders, trust links involve exclusive bilateral credit relationships among correspondent banks. However, the fixed costs required to build these links foster an expensive and concentrated system. This paper interprets different payment arrangements in terms of the implied trust structures. It discusses how the tokenization of money alters trust links and allows for a potentially more efficient market structure to exchange money. The paper ends with a suggested global marketplace to trade tokenized money directly across borders. [Read more at the IMF]

Call for expressions of interest to participate in scheme compatibility digital euro workstream

The European Central Bank (ECB) is inviting experts in payments schemes to contribute to the scheme compatibility workstream for the digital euro scheme Rulebook. The main objective of the workstream is to develop a proposal for the Rulebook design in order to facilitate the compatibility of the digital euro with existing scheme solutions. Applicants should be market participants and Eurosystem representatives, nominated by their respective payment stakeholder associations. They are expected to be senior experts in scheme management, preferably with managerial responsibilities in a European payment or payment-related scheme. Participation will not be remunerated, and all intellectual property rights, copyright and rights to development and disposal related to the deliverables of the workstream reside exclusively with the ECB. [Read more at the ECB]

Coordinated global crypto policies: G20 key financial stability priority

Last month’s first G20 Finance Ministers and Central Bank Governors (FMCBG) meeting under India’s presidency discussed key financial stability and regulatory priorities. India urged member nations to understand the macro-financial implications of crypto-assets and recommended formulating a coordinated global policy. In that regard, the Indian Presidency has proposed a joint technical paper by the IMF and the Financial Stability Board (FSB) which would synthesize the macroeconomic and regulatory perspectives of crypto-assets. Interest was also expressed in building a common taxonomy and a systematic classification of the crypto-asset universe. [Read more at the Press Information Bureau of the Indian Government]

Upcoming conferences, webinars and speaking engagements:

I’ll be providing a (probably virtual) update on global central bank digital currency (CBDC) developments at the Digital Euro Association Digital Euro Conference on March 31 in Frankfurt. [Register here]
I’ll be moderating a panel on “what happens when the lights go out…different schemes for offline functionality” at the in-person Digital Currency Conference (DCC) in Mexico City on May 18. [Register here]

Kiffmeister’s global central bank digital currency monthly monitor