The first 100,000 Jamaican citizens to use the country’s new central bank digital currency (CBDC) known as Jam-Dex, will be given a free $16 payment in the hopes of promoting widespread adoption. Jamaican prime minister Andrew Holness first announced the news in a Facebook post on Thursday. The post received a mixed response as some Facebook users praised Holness for “embracing a digital future”, while others expressed concern about the motivations of the Jamaican government, accusing Holness of trying to “bribe” citizens into the federal banking system. According to the Jamaica Observer, approximately 17% of the Jamaican population is currently …

Nine Republican senators have backed legislation aimed at directing policy at U.S. government agencies around concerns China’s digital yuan may be used to circumvent sanctions and compromise users' personal information. In a Wednesday announcement, Louisiana Senator Bill Cassidy and Tennessee Senator Marsha Blackburn, backed by seven other Republican senators, proposed the ‘Say No To the Silk Road Act’ — a bill that would require certain government agencies to report on China’s central bank digital currency, or CBDC. The two senators said they had concerns over digital surveillance and privacy in China’s rolling out its CBDC, both for its citizens and …

Paolo Ardoino, the chief technology officer at Tether, believes that the growing developments around central bank digital currencies (CBDCs) globally wouldn’t really impact the role of private stablecoins. Ardoino shared his two cents in a Twitter thread on the growing discussion around CBDCs and what could be their role in the current payment system. He said CBDCs would only replace the old-age centralized payment networks as SWIFT and use private blockchains to fulfill most transactions. He went on to explain that CBDCs are not about digitizing the fiat currency as it has already been done, given most modern-day transactions are …

As the world of finance continues to transform, new forms of money are challenging traditional monetary infrastructures that have been around for a long time. Currently, central bank digital currencies (CBDCs) have caught the eye of various countries, including the Philippines. In a joint event organized by Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) and the Alliance for Financial Inclusion, Benjamin E. Diokno, the Philippines’ central bank governor, announced the rollout of Project CBDCPh, a pilot implementation of a CBDC for the country. According to Diokno, the project aims to improve “the payment system’s safety, resiliency, and efficiency.” “The project aims to …

For a state with a small-town feel, Wyoming moves with big-city alacrity when it comes to things crypto. According to the bipartisan bill introduced into its legislature last week, a Wyoming stablecoin could debut before the end of 2022. The announcement caught even Wyoming banker and cryptocurrency champion Caitlin Long by surprise. “Didn't know it was coming,” tweeted the Avanti Bank CEO. It also raises some questions: Is a stablecoin really needed by Wyoming’s citizens? Is it feasible? Will it upset the state’s commercial banks including its recently chartered special purpose depository institutions (SPDIs) like Avanti which has issued a …

The Bank of Jamaica revealed the name of its upcoming central bank digital currency (CBDC) after a design competition, only to receive backlash from the local crypto community. The central bank of Jamaica announced on Twitter that it had chosen the name "Jam-Dex" along with the tagline and logo for its upcoming CBDC, scheduled for late 2022. While the project is promising, its name could be easily confused with a decentralized exchange (DEX), and its logo is "terrible," according to the community response. The name Jam-Dex is said to be taken from Jamaican Digital Exchange, with the slogan "no cash, …

After a banner year of 2021 for individual object sales through nonfungible tokens (NFTs), 2022 is poised to be the year of MetaFi. A recap of Beeple, Christie’s, Visa and endless aping-in celebrities hardly feels necessary, except to point out that we seem to be standing on (or perhaps have already crossed over) a fundamental precipice. While the rocket-propelled ascent of NFT prices will not continue forever, numerous voices have predicted that a mature tech stack for discovering, vetting, valuing, trading and protecting collections of digital assets will soon emerge, without a crash. But these optimistic takes may even be …

On Feb. 18, the Russian Ministry of Finance kicked off public consultations on the rules of cryptocurrency issuance and transactions. While a welcome development, it is less than the country’s crypto space had expected to get. Earlier in the week, the government announced that by Feb. 18, a bill containing the finance ministry and central bank’s consolidated position on crypto regulation would be drafted. Updated estimates suggest that it will take at least another month for draft legislation to see the light. The main reason for the delay appears to be the central bank’s renewed resistance, which just several days …

Lael Brainard, a member of the Federal Reserve’s board of governors, encouraged the United States to be a leader in research and policy regarding central bank digital currencies, or CBDCs, due to potential international developments. In remarks prepared for the U.S Monetary Policy Forum in New York on Friday, Brainard said the People's Bank of China’s pilot program for its digital yuan could have implications on the dollar’s dominance in cross-border payments and payment systems. However, a digital dollar could allow people around the world to continue to rely on its fiat counterpart. “It is prudent to consider how the …

The White House will reportedly be issuing an executive order as early as next week directing government agencies to study different aspects of the digital asset space with the goal of creating a comprehensive regulatory framework. In a Thursday report from Yahoo! Finance, Jennifer Schonberger said an official familiar with the matter within the Biden administration revealed the executive order could arrive as soon as next week. The directive from President Biden would reportedly order the Office of the Attorney General, the State Department, and the Treasury Department to study the potential rollout of a U.S.-issued central bank digital currency. …

The 2022 Winter Olympics participants, visitors and organizers could be spending more than $300,000 in China’s digital yuan every day, according to new reports citing officials from the People’s Bank of China. The e-CNY, China’s central bank digital currency (CBDC), is being used to make 2 million yuan ($316,000) or more worth of payments each day, PBoC’s Digital Currency Research Institute director-general Mu Changchun said. The official provided the data during a webinar hosted by the Atlantic Council, Reuters reported Tuesday. “I have a rough idea that there are several, or a couple of million digital yuan of payments every …

Amid more reports on the Bank of Russia rejecting the finance ministry’s proposal of cryptocurrency regulation, the central bank has kicked off trials of its own digital currency. The Russian central bank has officially launched the digital ruble trial, successfully completing the first central bank digital currency (CBDC) transfers among citizens, the Bank of Russia announced Tuesday. The launch aligns with the bank’s plans to debut the first digital ruble transactions in early 2022. Three banks out of 12 financial institutions in the digital ruble pilot group have already integrated the CBDC platform, with two of them completing a “full …