In a hearing before the Senate Banking Committee today on Tuesday, central bank digital currencies took center stage before an audience of Senators looking to upgrade financial infrastructure and expand financial inclusion in the country. The witnesses and the concerns The banking committee welcomed Paxos CEO Charles Cascarilla, financial inclusion professor and researcher at Duke Nakita Cuttino, and former CFTC Chair and current champion of the Digital Dollar Project Chris Giancarlo as witnesses. Cascarilla provided expertise on how existing stablecoins operate and the gaps in current finance that they fill. In his words, “Stablecoins address the antiquated plumbing of our …

Plenty of injustice plagues our communities. For instance, in our world, the unbanked and underbanked don’t have easy access to financial knowledge. All too often, that is reserved for people with wealth and opportunity. If you don’t have these resources shown or taught to you by a professional, you might not have adequate access to the necessary information for gaining financial literacy. Such education often only comes as income increases. So, how might we increase the income of the unbanked so as to arm them with more knowledge? Many of those at lower socioeconomic levels don’t know what Bitcoin (BTC) …

Beyond rapidly changing how we create, store and transfer value, cryptocurrencies are accelerating financial inclusion in a way that traditional financial institutions have either been unwilling or unable to. Yet crypto’s possibilities go way beyond banking the unbanked. It allows developing nations and those without access to financial services to avoid the bank completely and transact and grow small businesses using just a mobile phone. Why financial inclusion is so important Even today, almost 2 billion people around the world have no access to financial services. That’s approximately one-fourth of the global population. Having nowhere to place savings and not …

Amid contentious debate over the massive stimulus package in response to the coronavirus pandemic, Democrats in the United States House of Representatives look to implement the digital dollar to streamline payments to U.S. citizens outside of the traditional financial system. A digital dollar for direct payments to families A draft of the legislation circulating as of March 23 proposes the creation of digital wallets for U.S. citizens to be maintained by the Federal Reserve within a section entitled “Direct Stimulus Payments for Families.” The section envisions $2,000 monthly payments to every adult earning less than $75,000 a year, at which …

AB InBev, the company behind the Budweiser brand, is helping local African farmers to prove their income using blockchain, Yahoo Finance reports on Jan. 21. A blockchain-based system developed in partnership with BanQu tracks all the local suppliers of AB InBev, replacing the paper trail. AB InBev is a multinational conglomerate born out of the merger of several established beer producers. It includes Budweiser, Stella Artois and Corona as some of its most recognizable brands. The company has adopted a strategy of using local suppliers, receiving tax breaks for their added contribution to the country’s economy. However, this proved to …

The vast swathes of Africa’s fertile lands may ultimately prove a central arena for the ground-up development of innovative digital infrastructure and green energy projects. Recent pivotal moments in African trade, such as the African Continental Free Trade Agreement, are setting the table for an environment conducive to rapid growth, where both energy and financial infrastructure are a primary focus. Africa’s untapped economic potential is no secret. The continent’s population has soared past more than 1.3 billion, which accounts for roughly 17% of the world’s population and is mostly comprised of young people, with two-thirds of the population below the …

The International Blockchain Monetary Reserve (IBMR) and blockchain firm Algorand are jointly launching a microfinance platform and a dedicated token to promote financial inclusion in Southeast Asia. Per a press release shared with Cointelegraph on Dec. 12, the partnership between the two entities aims to develop and launch a microfinance ecosystem based on Algorand’s blockchain technology in a bid to boost the financial inclusion of the urban working poor in the region. Within the initiative, the parties will also introduce a dedicated token dubbed the Asia Reserve Currency Coin (ARCC). Not to provide free spending money ARCC is designed to …

OmiseGo, a finance-oriented scaling network for Ethereum (ETH), has become a member of Universal Protocol Alliance, a coalition of blockchain and cryptocurrency-focused firms. Targeting financial services and tax collection In a press release shared with Cointelegraph on Oct. 8, the startup revealed that it will incorporate the Universal Protocol Platform UPT utility token into its payment processing technology. By doing so, OmiseGo intends to let stakeholders to use UP stablecoins for financial services and tax collection, as well as collect transaction fees. Dan Schatt, co-founder of the Universal Protocol Alliance, said that OmiseGo’s technology “will help support the mass adoption …

The “founding father of blockchain” has praised the company behind a mobile-based cryptocurrency — and how its long-term goals go beyond profit maximization to create a better world for everyone. Globally renowned scientist and cryptographer Scott Stornetta was instrumental in inventing blockchain technology back in 1991. He was quoted in Satoshi Nakamoto’s white paper for Bitcoin — and indeed, there has even been some speculation that the Japanese-speaking visionary may himself be the anonymous crypto inventor. Upon reviewing Electroneum, which aims to deliver a new era of digital payments by allowing funds to be sent and received via smartphones without …

San Francisco-based nonprofit Kiva, a company that crowdfunds loans for financial inclusion, has launched a blockchain platform for credit history with the government of Sierra Leone. According to a Reuters report on Aug. 21, Kiva and the President of Sierra Leone, Julius Maada Bio, jointly launched the blockchain initiative in Freetown, the country’s capital. Biometric data collected by the government, such as fingerprints, will be used by the platform to give lenders a way of obtaining the credit history of loan applicants. Individuals looking to borrow money would have a digital wallet for loans, and their transactions would be recorded …

Internet crowdsourcing company Share Internet Data Ltd (SID) has partnered with private equity firm LDJ Capital to launch a blockchain-based digital banking solution. The new digital banking app is called LDJ Digital, according to a press release on July 16. According to the announcement, LDG Digital can function as a debit card and it supports both fiat money and cryptocurrencies. Moreover, the professed goal of LDJ Digital is to provide banking services to the unbanked, as per the report. LDJ Digital will reportedly be a part of the existing SID platform and is based on its core technologies and principles. …

A site enabling consumers to buy Bitcoin using hundreds of different payment methods says demand is thriving despite declining cryptocurrency prices — with Africa being its biggest market. Paxful says the volume of transactions it has processed from the continent has risen by more than 130 percent — and now, an average of 17,351 trades per day are being made by its users in Africa. As well as enabling consumers to buy crypto using debit cards and platforms such as PayPal, the company has carved a niche in the market by allowing users to exchange gift cards and vouchers for …