The Race Towards a Central Bank Digital Currency

As the world became more digital during the pandemic, so did our economy. Cryptocurrency is designed for a digital economy, and the growth of ecommerce and online payments was one of the big catalysts for crypto’s recent rise.

This article by Voyager was an exciting one for me to read because it perfectly explained many of the points I’ve addressed in previous articles regarding digital currency as well as its prophetic significance, albeit coming from a purely secular viewpoint.

What the article essentially communicates is that as acceptance and adoption of cryptocurrencies (such as bitcoin, altcoins like ethereum, and stablecoins like USDC) widens it will also lead to a greater race for Central Bank Digital Currency (CBDC for short). In fact, this race is already happening.

Keeping this in mind, we also have to realize that no nation is going to want to lag behind in this race. This was one of the points I made in my article concerning the federal reserve trying to get more serious in looking into creating a digital currency. The article goes on to state that “more than 60 central banks are exploring and researching CBDCs”.

On Wednesday, a news story broke that the European Central Bank warned that other countries who fail to launch their own digital currency will lose control.

The article then goes on by posing a scenario in which big tech companies such as Amazon or Google create their own digital currency, “With Facebook’s Diem on the horizon, the thought is that if countries don’t move fast enough they may struggle to compete with big tech stablecoins, which could lead to even faster rising of inflation without private banks at the helm. Will we have an Amazon, Twitter and Samsung coin in the future? We’ll have to see, but the race to digitize cash for countries and companies is most definitely on.”

I’ve talked about Facebook’s Libra currency in December 2020 and did an article on how Europe’s Central Bank started to prepare for a digital Euro due to China’s race to implement their Digital Yuan (which they have) as well as due to their fear over Facebook’s Libra being released in January of this year. I haven’t caught up with the latest news concerning the Libra so I’m not sure where that’s at.

But the point of this is that if other big tech companies started getting into creating their own digital currency that would be a major development. Governments would likely react in such a scenario because they wouldn’t want to be left behind. In that case, they’d either hamper the efforts of big tech, further rush the creation of their own CBDC, or both.

Why should we care about any of this? Due to a crucial point the article makes which I’ve made myself several times concerning where digital currency may be leading us, “One concern many have around CBDCs is the ability to track and control people and their finances. If the central banks control a centralized ledger, the vice grip on financial surveillance could tighten even further.” 

This is the main point I bring to you today. With the implementation of a Central Bank Digital Currency, a government will have more surveillance and control over those who use it. This means more control over what people buy and sell. Sound familiar? (Revelation 13:16-17)

Part of the increase in the popularity of digital currencies has also been due to the coronavirus pandemic, “There is a growing acceptance of digital currencies—spurred on by the COVID-19 pandemic—according to a report by the Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU) and commissioned by Crypto.com.” (Decrypt). Towards the beginning of the pandemic here in the US, I also shared my thoughts that I could see how the pandemic could cause us to further embrace a cashless society which was exactly what we saw. In fact, I made this point in the first article I wrote on the pandemic in March.

Money is rapidly evolving. Only a few years ago, there seemed to be very little commercial or popular support for even the idea of a digital currency, and within the past year, we’ve seen several governments announce new plans to create digital versions of their currencies…the trend towards cashless payments has existed before 2021; but COVID-19 accelerated this move away from cash. 

I don’t see the rise in the popularity of cryptocurrency as well as its adoption which then leads to the creation of CBDCs as a coincidence which brings me to why this all excites me and should also excite you. In my article, What is the Prophetic Significance of Digital Currency?, I elaborated on why I believe this digital currency race is prophetically significant.

I believe that it’s possible that this “CBDC race” may very well contribute to or be laying the groundwork for the mark of the beast system that comes about during the tribulation and that as we see efforts for this progress it shows us how close this time period is, and even closer the rapture of the church.

CBDC Race: Stablecoins and big tech put pressure on central banks to create their own currency

Invest Voyager: Voyager CEO, Steve Ehrlich, said on Fox Business this week, “There will be more companies accepting crypto…and more companies will accept stablecoins as the first step before accepting Bitcoin.” (Fox Business)

Most stablecoins, such as USDC, are simply a digital version of a fiat currency, meaning there is a dollar kept in an audited bank account for each dollar circulated digitally on the blockchain. Stablecoins always maintain parity with the dollar, giving traders an easy way to take profits, merchants a way to accept crypto without the risk of volatility, and institutions a frictionless way to move large sums of money–all powered by the benefits of the blockchain.

Stablecoins also create a decentralized and institutional lending ecosystem that allows credible companies to borrow and lend stable coins. This is how Voyager currently offers 9% interest APR on USDC. 

We often talk about disruption and, while stablecoins may appear on the surface to be the least disruptive asset in the crypto market, they demonstrate the ability for technology and innovators to create faster and more efficient solutions than the laggard traditional financial system.

It’s for all of these reasons that a race has begun for central banks and governments to digitize their dollar and launch their own CBDC, or central bank digital currency. Imagine how fast stimulus money could enter the economy if there was a digital dollar issued by the Fed and all citizens had a Fed wallet that could be funded near-instantaneously.  From universal basic income, to serving the millions of people who are unbanked, the use cases of CBDCS are immense. 

In a recent study released from PwC, more than 60 central banks are exploring and researching CBDCs (PwC CBDC Global index report), including the Bahamas, Cambodia, Ecuador and more. 

This week it was announced that the Chinese government is launching a lottery for its digital yuan to do some trials in Beijing. This will be a part of its pilot program where they will distribute 40 million digital yuan ($6.3 million dollars) to test the new system. The program is quite clever, as they will distribute the money to 200,000 winners who can download a banking app and use the prizes at nearly 2,000 merchants. (CoinTelegraph) Read More

Other articles in this series:

1. The Race Towards a Central Bank Digital Currency II

Sources

1. CBDC Race: Stablecoins and big tech put pressure on central banks to create their own currency (June 4th, 2021) – Invest Voyager
2. ‘COVID-19 Accelerated Digital Currency Adoption’: The Economist Intelligence Unit (May 26th, 2021) – Decrypt