The central bank digital currency (CBDC) issued by Banco Central do Brasil is reportedly set to see the light of day in 2024. Its main purpose will be to boost financial services in the country.
The South American nation is not the only one willing to introduce such a monetary product. China, Russia, Japan, Australia, the United Kingdom, and many more have also displayed such intentions.
- As reported by Reuters, Brazil’s CBDC will be named DREX and is expected to go live next year. It will employ distributed ledger technology (DLT) to settle wholesale interbank transactions, whereas retail access will be based on the digital equivalent of existing bank deposits.
- Fabio Araujo – coordinator of the digital real – said DREX will aim at advancing the domestic financial network by improving access to monetary services. He raised hopes that it could also boost investments, lending, and insurance services.
“By enabling simple and reliable access to registered values through DLT technology, we reduce costs and democratize access to financial services,” he stated.
- Araujo argued that some Brazilians have already started conducting digital settlements via the payment platform Pix.
- It is interesting to note that well-known finance companies have supported Brazil’s CBDC project. Some examples are the payment processing giant Mastercard and the leading developer of software services Sinqia.
- As CryptoPotato recently reported, the largest cryptocurrency exchange in the country – Mercado Libre – also joined the initiative.