Bank of Thailand delays retail CBDC launch timeline

The retail digital baht should show additional benefits for the financial system with sound risk management. This was stated by Thailand’s central bank governor Setaput Sutivartnarueput, reports The Bangkok Post.

According to the governor, as a result the launch could be postponed by up to five years.

The central bank assesses the positive and negative properties CBDC in comparison with the country’s leading payments platform PromptPay. It also studies the programmability of the digital currency.

From the end of 2022 to mid-2023, a pilot programme will run, in which the digital baht will be tested by around 10,000 users.

In May 2019, the Bank of Thailand and Hong Kong launched the Inthanon-LionRock project to study the use of wholesale CBDC in cross-border payments.

In 2021, the central banks of China and the UAE joined the participants.

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