The Bank of England (BoE) and the UK Treasury announced PayPal and Visa as some of the corporate companies that will be working on a possible central bank digital currency (CBDC).
Related: PayPal co-founder David Sacks laments the company’s dark turn towards censorship
Chancellor Rishi Sunak dubbed the potential CBDC “Britcoin.” Earlier this year, the government created two advisory groups, the Engagement Forum and the Technology Forum, to explore the possibility of creating “Britcoin.”
The Technology Forum held its first meeting this month. It has been tasked with helping the BoE understand the technological aspects of the design, operation, and implementation of a CBDC.
Members of the Technology Forum include David MacKeith, a technology advisor at Amazon Web Services, Mastercard’s VP of blockchain and digital assets Patrick O’Donnell, PayPal’s CTO for blockchain and digital currencies Edwin Akoi, and Maz Malcolm of Visa’s solution architecture.
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The Mastercard and Visa duopoly is fast becoming the biggest threat to alternative tech
The Engagement Forum, which will hold its first meeting later this year, is tasked with helping the UK Treasury understand the practical challenges of implementing a CBDC. The group includes experts in the fields of financial services, academia, and civil society. It will include representatives from the banking experts HSBC and Morgan Stanley, reports Business Insider.
The Bank for International Settlements (BIS) conducted a survey that concluded a majority of central banks around the world are looking into the pros and cons of CBDCs. According to the BIS, one of the advantages of government-backed digital currencies would be cutting the costs and time of international payments.
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