PwC: Bahamas and Cambodia Lead CBDC Development Ahead of China

The leaders in the development of central bank digital currencies (CBDCs) are the Bahamas and Cambodia. They have surpassed their Chinese counterparts, according to a report by the consulting firm PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC).

The PwC experts’ Global CBDC Index reflects central banks’ progress in developing digital currencies and public interest in two use cases:

• retail CBDCs owned by corporations and citizens;
• wholesale CBDCs used in interbank payments.

The report states that CBDCs will make a significant contribution to modernising the international currency landscape alongside a reshaping of the payment and financial infrastructure.

“Ordinary citizens stand to gain more from the deployment of national digital currencies, as this will give them access to central-bank digital money for the first time,” said PwC partner Henri Arslanian.

The Bahamas topped the retail CBDC ranking with a score of 92 out of 100. On 20 October 2020, the regulator of this country launched Sand Dollar, accessible via a mobile app and a physical payment card.

Cambodia was in second place with 82 points, third was China with 75 points, and fourth was Ukraine with 71 points.

In the wholesale CBDC rankings, Thailand and Hong Kong shared first place with 80 points, while Singapore was in third place on 75 points.

Eighty-eight per cent of projects studied by PwC analysts are based on blockchain as the underlying technology, with a higher degree of centralisation.

The People’s Bank of China ruled out the introduction of fully anonymous CBDCs.

Earlier, the Bank for International Settlements and seven leading central banks worldwide arrived at the same conclusion due to AML/CFT rules.

According to Raiffeisenbank’s estimates, by 2025 sovereign digital currencies and exchanges for trading such assets will appear in circulation in 10% of states.

Pwc Cbdc Global Index 1st Edition April 2021 by ForkLog on Scribd

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