CBDC Tests Under Project Rosalind Pushes ‘Britcoin’ for the UK

The notion of central bank digital currency (CBDC) is becoming popular across the countries, with its early embracers also rising worldwide. Central banks are seeking possibilities with the digital currencies, from developing to developed economies. The United Kingdom (UK) has also signaled to bring its own CBDC, for which, the pathway has become more smooth with the recent developments. 

Experiment’s Success Leads to CBDC Development

Last week, Project Rosalind completed two of its phases successfully, and this is likely to lay down the victory for Britain’s digital currency “Britcoin.” The project carried out by the London Hub of Bank for International Settlements (BIS) and Bank of England, submitted its report on Friday, June 16. 

According to the report, both the institutions developed about 33 application programming interfaces (APIs) and tested over more than 30 use cases of a CBDC. The use cases include crucial issues from offline payments facilities to child-parent wallets in digital assets. 

The experiment had started in July last year and found that CBDC could act as a cheaper and efficient way to make payments between individuals. For institutions, the financial vehicle would allow the creation of new products aiming for the reduction of fraudulent activities. 

Given the smartphones being a crucial part of businesses and in daily lives today, the project sought the possibilities for CBDC inclined with smartphones. It tested if it could work for retail vendors and online stores. The study also looked upon programmability. For reference, it’s an ability for a digital asset to get customized in specific ways according to certain conditions.

The study ultimately found over 30 use cases for retail CBDC across 33 API functions. It concluded retail CBDC payments could be safely provided given the interaction between the central bank and the private sector through a well designed API. 

The Head of the BIS Innovation Hub London Centre, Francesca Hopwood Road, stated in a press release about how the project looked for safe and secure payments like use cases through CBDC given the support of API layers. 

Hopwood Road noted the two key advancements through the experiment which was to explore the way for retail CBDC systems to get supported by an API layer. And also, it would be to find out the safe and secure payments through CBDCs. 

In addition, there was another project dubbed Project Meridian, with both the prominent financial institutions backing it. The project was to study and test the distributed ledger technology’s use case in running transactions across the banks. 

According to Hopwood Road, the Banks of International Settlements does research in multiple areas and looks for contribution in the ongoing efforts towards CBDC development and deployments. 

Nancy J. Allen is a crypto enthusiast and believes that cryptocurrencies inspire people to be their own banks and step aside from traditional monetary exchange systems. She is also intrigued by blockchain technology and its functioning.

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