The Central Bank of the United Arab Emirates (UAE) announced the issuance of CBDC as part of its country’s financial infrastructure transformation programme.
The national digital currency is designed for cross-border and domestic use. The initiative will bolster the UAE’s competitiveness as a financial and payments hub.
The transformation programme also includes a unified platform for card payments and an instant payments system to create a cashless society. Overall, the central bank has prepared nine projects for the first phase.
In October 2022, the UAE Central Bank completed pilot tests of cross-border payments using CBDC and reported good results in terms of cost, speed and security.
Earlier in January 2023, the central bank of Saudi Arabia, which borders the UAE, said no decision on issuing CBDC. The regulator will continue studying the use cases for the national digital currency.