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What is the fuss over central-bank digital currencies?

economist.com

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Re: What is the fuss over central-bank digital currencies?

#141

Post by WEFwoof »

walterbell wrote: post #110

IMF video clip with BIS director on CBDCs (at 24:00), https://meetings.imf.org/en/2020/Annual/Schedule/2020/10/19/... > With cash, we don't know who is using the 100 dollar bill today ... a key difference with CBDC is that the central bank will have absolute control on the rules and regulations that determine the expression of that central bank liability .. also we will have the technology to enforce that ... if an a…

Thank you for the link!

Indeed it was Carstens and not Georgieva (as I wasn't clear in my other comment).

Re: What is the fuss over central-bank digital currencies?

#142

Post by headmelted »

surfsvammel wrote: post #105
headmelted wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I could see CBDCs using blockchain solely because someone utterly non-technical, at some higher level in the bureaucracy, insisted that they make a blockchain-based cryptocurrency “so as to not get left behind” or “because we need to compete with Bitcoin”. Clearly neither of those two rationales make any sense whatsoever - and they might even seem like a downright ridiculous suggestion to some readers of this respons…

That’s not me. I but can see how a DLT could work very well as means of a currency. We could have the commercial banks, and others if necessary, run nodes. They could verify payments on “accounts”, or addresses, (if we want to keep the old meaning of bank account, that’s fine, then we could instead call these addresses) which are held by the commercial banks. These addresses could be non-anonymous such that requireme…

But why do that though?

If the currency is going to be centrally issued then what reason is there to use a DLT given all of the drawbacks it would introduce?

DLTs aren’t a solution to a technical problem, they’re a technical solution to a trust problem that comes with some pretty hefty implementation baggage and performance constraints.

If you have to trust a single issuer anyway (as would be the case with a CBDC) then the core reason for using a DLT doesn’t exist.

Re: What is the fuss over central-bank digital currencies?

#143

Post by FabHK »

notsureaboutpg wrote: post #121
dgellow wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Switzerland isn't considered progressive in any way, in fact it's a very conservative country compared to its neighbors (source: I'm from there).

Progressive used to mean you were concerned with the freedom and liberty of individuals and with transparency in government. That seems closest to "Libertarian" in American terms, and Switzerland, as a neutral country along with other European style politics, seems to fit that bill

Well, progressive originally meant marching forward, making progress [1]. As such it is literally the opposite of conservative, which means "disposed to retain and maintain what is established, opposed to innovation and change," or, in a negative sense, "opposed to progress" [2].

[1] from Etymology Online (!ety on DDG): "characterized by advancement, going forward, moving onward" (in action, character, etc.), from progress (n.) + -ive, or else from French progressif, from past participle stem of Latin progredi. From the notion of "using one's efforts toward advancement or improvement" comes the meaning "characterized by striving for change and innovation, avant-garde, liberal" (in arts, etc.), from 1908; of jazz, from 1947. In the socio-political sense "favoring reform; radically liberal" it emerged in various British contexts from the 1880s; in the U.S. it was given to a movement active in the 1890s and a generation thereafter, the name being taken again from time to time, most recently by some more liberal Democrats and other social activists, by c. 2000.

https://www.etymonline.com/word/progressive

[2] https://www.etymonline.com/word/conservative

Re: What is the fuss over central-bank digital currencies?

#144

Post by Proven »

> For central banks, digital cash offers a safer, faster and more flexible alternative to notes and coins

Who the hell is the customer here? The people or the banks?

They say some people might like having the option to keep their money on a trusted official platform. That is exactly a scenario that I want to avoid: I don't want to have any of my savings denominated in state-owned or state-endorsed currency.

I mean, they aim to steal 2% per year by way of inflation. Why on earth would anyone want to do business with such thieves?

Re: What is the fuss over central-bank digital currencies?

#145

Post by Proven »

nigerian-craft wrote: post #52
dv_dt wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Cash is private. Most cryptocoin are not particularly private. The few that set out to be private may or may not succeed at being private or being a widely exchanged digital currency.

I'd like to introduce you to a man named David Chaum https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blind_signature https://docs.wasabiwallet.io/building-wasabi/TechnicalOvervi...

DC's coin is here: https://xx.network

Re: What is the fuss over central-bank digital currencies?

#146

Post by loceng »

bawolff wrote: post #43
anm89 wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Are you saying that digital currency is a fancy term for a direct deposit? Basically yes, but specifically only for the case of a direct deposit between the Federal reserve and an individual. That doesn't currently exist. But that's also basically my point. CBDCs are nothing new from an operational or technological perspective which I think is something many people are getting confused about. They are a new thing i…

Fair enough. I guess it feels almost unbelievable that all this fuss is over something so mundane. I guess i dont really understand why though. It sounds like the central bank is thinking about becoming, well, a normal bank. We already have normal banks. Governments can already transfer cash to accounts in normal banks. Governments can already sell bonds to people who want some sort of very stable investment backed b…

"Fair enough. I guess it feels almost unbelievable that all this fuss is over something so mundane."

It's because Bitcoiners chants to rally a number of different causes, that pro-Bitcoiners claim through their propaganda will claim it's the solution for A, B, C ... X, Y, Z - from local to global issues - so the group grows by bringing in people who want to solve those issues and believe the claims to be true - who are aligned by what - money, a financial incentive of Bitcoin being structured as an MLM - and arguably has a Ponzi scheme structure as well. Then you have it being global and decentralized, then you get marketing forums online taking it on to be at the base of the MLM, then you get the VC-financial industrial complex aligned with it + amplified by mainstream media.

The Republican party many decades ago was taken over by industrial complexes/corporations - and because corporations couldn't vote - they rallied with narratives/messaging to attract different smaller interest groups to become aligned; Noam Chomsky explains this here: https://boingboing.net/2019/04/20/useful-idiots-r-us.html

Re: What is the fuss over central-bank digital currencies?

#147

Post by marcosdumay »

diroussel wrote: post #136
marcosdumay wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If the problem is "I have a bank account, now I want to receive payments automatically without depending on anything else", you are looking for a money transfer protocol. The Brazilian Pix is quite interesting, as an open protocol, but I don't known of any read made FOSS client for it yet. There are other nationwide protocols around, some open, but most closed, some closed with publicly accessible middleman. Now we a…

There are a lot of cost savings to be made in a move to a national digital currency. Just settlement alone could be made way cheaper. Swift could be cut out as the middleman. It would be a good cost saving innovation.

Yes, I saw the other threads about international settlements. The discussion here on HN is very illuminating.

Re: What is the fuss over central-bank digital currencies?

#148

Post by dgellow »

notsureaboutpg wrote: post #121
dgellow wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Switzerland isn't considered progressive in any way, in fact it's a very conservative country compared to its neighbors (source: I'm from there).

Progressive used to mean you were concerned with the freedom and liberty of individuals and with transparency in government. That seems closest to "Libertarian" in American terms, and Switzerland, as a neutral country along with other European style politics, seems to fit that bill

I think you mean liberal and not progressive, in the "classical liberal" sense (though the US seems to have a different meaning for this, so I'm not sure if that matches well). Switzerland is economically liberal and socially very conservative. I don't know what you mean by European style politics, I cannot see what the country system has in common with the EU, but we regularly clash with EU's politics and refused multiple time to join the union.
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