The People’s Bank of China (PBoC) announced that the test run of its central bank digital currency is currently limited to small retail transactions. According to the Global Times on Aug. 24, the central bank has clarified some details regarding the recent digital yuan — also known as digital currency electronic payment, or DCEP — in order to address rumors regarding the scale and scope of recent pilot projects. Per the report, some Chinese internet users claimed that a person in Shenzhen received a large amount of PBoC’s digital currency after selling local real estate. Wang Peng, an assistant professor …

China’s nationwide blockchain project, the Blockchain Service Network, or BSN, will be integrating stablecoin support in 2021. Yifan He, CEO of Red Date Technology, a major tech company involved in the BSN development, told Cointelegraph that the project will soon start integrating stablecoins. Piloted in late 2019, China’s BSN is a state-backed initiative that intends to support medium-sized businesses in building and deploying blockchain applications. The exec explained that stablecoins will be used as payment for various services on the BSN ecosystem, including cloud resources. “Only stablecoins can make it much easier, quicker and safer,” the executive noted. Stablecoins will …

The former governor of Reserve Bank of India, Raghuram Rajan, said that private cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin (BTC) and Facebook’s Libra may have a future even when central banks roll out their own digital currencies. Rajan, who was also the Chief Economist and Research Director at the International Monetary Fund from 2003–2006, said during a CNBC podcast that one of these digital currencies might only become problematic if it were to hold a monopoly. However, he believes that there will be other private digital currencies that will play different roles and provide strong competition to existing ones. The former central banker …

XRP, the world’s third largest cryptocurrencies by market capitalization, is not competing with national digital currencies like the forthcoming digital yuan, according to a senior executive at Ripple. Emi Yoshikawa, senior director of global operations at Ripple, claimed that XRP does not compete either with central bank digital currencies (CBDC) or stablecoins. In an Aug. 19 interview with Japanese crypto exchange FXcoin, Yoshikawa said that XRP is complementary to the global progress in CBDC and stablecoin development. The exec stated that XRP should be considered as a “bridge asset” in international settlement: “There are various types of crypto assets, but …

Thailand’s central bank is looking at smart contracts and decentralized finance (DeFi) implementations for its national digital currency, the digital baht. Vijak Sethaput, senior developer for the Bank of Thailand’s (BoT) central bank digital currency project Inthanon, discussed the country’s CBDC progress in an interview hosted by a global think tank for central banking, the Official Monetary and Financial Institutions Forum, on Aug. 13. Sethaput was joined by Sky Guo, CEO of New York-based enterprise blockchain firm Cypherium, which is focused on global CBDC implementations and interoperability. In the interview, Guo said that global jurisdictions can borrow from the DeFi …

China’s Commerce Ministry announced today that it will expand the trials of the nation’s central bank digital currency (CBDC) to include Beijing, as well as Tianjin and Hebei provinces. According to an Aug. 14 report by the Wall Street Journal, there is not yet a set time when the expanded pilot program of the Chinese CBDC will begin. Still, the nation’s Ministry of Commerce announced that the policy framework should be complete by the end of 2020. As Cointelegraph reported earlier this week, the expanded pilot will also include the Hong Kong Greater Bay area — consisting of nine cities …

The Federal Reserve Bank of Boston has entered into a partnership with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology to better understand the concept of digital currencies. The bank will work with MIT researchers on a multiyear project to develop and test the use cases of a “hypothetical” central bank digital currency (CBDC), said Fed Governor Lael Brainard during her speech at the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco. She said that digital currencies bring both opportunities and threats related to privacy, illicit activity and financial stability, and the Reserve must clearly understand both aspects of it as they proceed towards the …

China’s digital yuan, also known as the digital currency electronic payment, or DCEP project, will be rolled out for testing at Hong Kong’s Greater Bay Area in the coming weeks, local news agency the Southern Daily reports on Aug. 12. The Greater Bay Area, or GBA, is a megapolis consisting of nine cities including Guangzhou, Shenzhen, as well as Hong Kong, and Macau. A major financial and tech hub in Asia, the GBA has a combined population of over 69 million people and GDP of around $1.5 trillion. He Xiaojun, director of the Local Financial Supervision Administration Bureau of Guangdong …

A group of state-run commercial banks in China are reportedly conducting a large-scale internal testing of a digital wallet designed for China’s national digital currency, the digital yuan. According to an Aug. 5 report by Reuters, the banks are testing the wallet application to transfer money and make payments in China’s central bank digital currency, or CBDC. As reported, the development was initially revealed to China’s state-backed newspaper the 21st Century Business Herald by several employees at involved state banks in cities including Shenzhen. The new development represents another major milestone in China’s progress in adopting the digital yuan and …

China, one of the world’s most strict jurisdictions for cryptocurrency trading, has not completely banned Bitcoin (BTC), a local non-profit arbitration organization says. According to a July 30 report published by the Beijing Arbitration Commission (BAC), China's prohibition of Bitcoin is more nuanced than some have suggested. Bitcoin does not constitute money in China In the report, the BAC clarified China's legal stance on cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin and outlined major crypto-related activities that are prohibited by the government. According to the BAC, China prohibits token funding and trading platforms from engaging in exchanges between the legal tender and virtual currency …

Sharon Bowen, a former Commissioner at the United States Commodities Futures Trading Commission, today said that the U.S. was falling behind other nations that are working on a central bank digital currency, or CBDC. During a webinar hosted by the consultancy firm Accenture, Bowen — currently a board member at Intercontinental Exchange — said that a CBDC would help the U.S. dollar maintain prominence in the world economy. She stated that if the U.S. does not want other nations to “threaten the monetary policy or monetary supply” of the dollar, it must seriously consider cross-border transactions through the use of …

The Chairman of Kazakhstan's anti-corruption service has called on the government to develop a national digital currency to fight corruption in the country. Alik Shpekbayev, chairman of Anti-corruption Agency of the Republic of Kazakhstan, reportedly said that national digital currencies like China’s digital yuan should contribute to a more transparent financial system. The news was reported by local news agency Kazinform on July 21. National digital currency is expected to cut cash transactions According to the official, an implementation of the national digital currency should inevitably reduce transactions in cash, which is one of major tools for illicit activity like …