Reserve Bank of Australia Unveils Proposed CBDC Use Cases

The Reserve Bank of Australia said on March 3 that it has selected 14 digital currency proposed use cases from a large number of submissions obtained from industry participants. An assistant governor at the RBA, Brad Jones, said the Aussie central bank is encouraged by the composition of providers that have been “invited to participate in the live pilot.”

Collaboration Between Industry Participants and the Central Bank

The Australia central bank, which has been exploring the benefits of central bank digital currency (CBDC), recently announced the digital currency’s proposed use cases as well as the names of providers “invited to participate in the live pilot.” In a press statement, the bank, which is known as the Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA), said the chosen use cases were selected from a large number of submissions from industry participants.

Brad Jones, an assistant governor at the RBA, is quoted in the statement lauding the industry participants’ willingness to engage regulators. Jones said:

We are delighted with the enthusiastic engagement by industry in this important research project. It has also been encouraging that the use case providers that have been invited to participate in the pilot span a wide range of entities in the Australian financial system, from smaller fintechs to large financial institutions.

According to Jones, the pilot as well as the more comprehensive study will be conducted in parallel to “serve two ends.” The first of these ends is helping the industry gain some “hands-on learning” experience. Bolstering policymakers’ understanding of “how a CBDC could potentially benefit the Australian financial system and economy.”

CBDC Design Considerations

For his part, Dilip Rao, a CBDC program director with the Digital Finance Cooperative Research Centre (DFCRC), said the process of “validating use cases” with industry participants and regulators is important because it will likely “inform further research into design considerations for a CBDC that could potentially play a role in a tokenised economy.”

Meanwhile, some of the use cases chosen by the RBA include offline payments, corporate bond payments, and funds custody. As shown by the statement, the RBA has chosen around 14 use cases and more than eight chosen providers.

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Terence Zimwara

Terence Zimwara is a Zimbabwe award-winning journalist, author and writer. He has written extensively about the economic troubles of some African countries as well as how digital currencies can provide Africans with an escape route.