Digital yuan, China’s central bank digital currency (CBDC), has been used in transactions worth nearly $10 billion, according to an official with the Chinese central bank, the People’s Bank of China (PBOC).
Digital Yuan or e-CNY’s Adoption Rises, Nearly $10 Billion Transacted. In addition, the government digital wallet has been downloaded by about 140 million people.
Director-general of the digital currency institute of China’s central bank, the People’s Bank of China (PBOC), Mu Changchun, at the Hong Kong’s Fintech Week conference Wednesday, revealed that 140 million people downloaded the wallet for China’s central bank digital currency (CBDC), the e-CNY, as of October 2021. As reported by Reuters, the digital yuan has been used in transactions totaling about 62 billion yuan ($9.7 billion).
Mu added that as at now, a total of 1.55 million merchants could accept payments using e-CNY wallets, including utilities, catering services, transportation, retail, and government services.
The e-CNY was unveiled in 2019
Several countries’ central banks worldwide especially in Africa are exploring their own CBDCs. The Atlantic Council’s CBDC tracker shows that, 87 countries are now exploring a CBDC, amongst them, seven have launched, 17 are being piloted, 15 are under development, and 39 are being researched.
In September, the head of the Bank of International Settlements (BIS) Innovation Hub, Benoît Cœuré, urged central banks to act on central bank digital currencies now to compete with initiatives in the private sector, including cryptocurrencies.