Visa will pilot a programme in April this year that will offer central banks a way to test retail applications for digital currencies (CBDCs), according to a report in Bloomberg. The company is launching this programme in collaboration with ConsenSys Inc.—a blockchain software company, the report added. Visa had a discussion with nearly 30 central banks on their goals concerning CBDCs, the report said. Its partner, ConsenSys, has previously collaborated with several central banks to test CBDCs, including the Hong Kong Monetary Authority, the Reserve Bank of Australia, and the Bank of Thailand. The company is led by Ethereum co-founder Joseph Lubin. Several central banks are exploring the option of CBDCs as a bulwark against cryptocurrencies' growing popularity. Many of these banks view crypto as an existential threat. The pilot programme could prove to be useful in facilitating a faster rollout of CBDCs given Visa’s expertise in dealing with huge volumes of payments. Mastercard has its own pilot programme Mastercard had announced its own virtual testing environment for central banks to evaluate CBDC use cases in September 2020. The platform enabled the simulation of issuance, distribution, and exchange of CBDCs between banks, financial service providers and consumers. The company had invited central banks, commercial banks, and tech and advisory firms to assess CBDC tech designs, validate use cases, and evaluate interoperability with existing payment rails available for consumers and businesses. What are CBDCs? They are digital currencies designed to be equivalent in value to a nation’s paper currency and subject to the…
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Visa launches pilot programme for central banks to test digital currencies: Report
It gives a chance for central banks to examine the use cases for their respective digital currency, prior to full rollout.
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