The world’s most powerful monetary policy chief, Jerome Powell, recently spoke on why the U.S central bank had no reason to rush into central bank digital currencies.
In a YouTube webinar organised by Yahoo Finance and conducted by highly revered economist, Markus Brunnermeier, the U.S Fed Reserve Chairman stated that the US central bank desires to get it right and hence doesn’t feel an urge or need to be the first.
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“Since we are the world’s reserve currency, we actually think we need to get this right, and we don’t feel an urge or need to be first,” he said. “We effectively already have a first-mover advantage, because we’re the reserve currency.”
Powell also revealed that stablecoins were of high-level priority.
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“We’ve been very focused… on potential regulatory answers for global stablecoins, in particular,” said Powell in response to a question about CBDCs, or central bank digital currencies.
“So that’s been a high-level focus, and that will continue to be a high-level focus because they could become systemically important overnight and we don’t begin to have, you know, our arms around the potential risks and how to manage those risks, and the public will expect we do and has every right to expect that… It’s a very high priority.”
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Recall many months ago, the world’s largest economy considered the use of digital dollars, following slow COVID-19 stimulus payments to its citizens. The U.S Congress recently heard testimonies on the usage of digital dollars to facilitate the U.S’ legacy financial infrastructure.
Just yesterday, America’s Congressional Fintech Task Force examined Federation Accounts and the use of digital dollars in expanding financial reach in the United States.
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What you need to know about Digital Dollar: The U.S government considered a framework in creating a U.S. central bank digital currency, which would be mined through the blockchain protocol, transferred between users, and recorded in a public ledger.
- The digital dollars would be stored in a distributed database via the internet, on an electronic computer database, within a stored-value card or virtual files.