Stablecoin News for the week ending Wednesday 9th March.
Here is our pick of the 3 most important Stablecoin news stories during the week.
Build it and they will come!
This seems to be the week when Central banks have got serious about actually building CBDC’s.
First, the ECB is seeking through it’s procurement procedure to acquire strategic partners for consultancy services that allow the delivery of excellent, strategic capabilities to support solving complex questions that are not only new to the ECB but also globally in the context of central banking digital currencies (CBDCs).
The services to be provided under the scope of this tender procedure are related to:
- the investigation phase of the digital euro project; and
- subject to the decision of the ECB Governing Council to continue the project after the investigation phase – realisation phase of the digital euro project.
In a clear signal of seriousness the ECB has indicated a budget of 20m EUR.
Services – 99799-2022 – TED Tenders Electronic Daily (europa.eu)
Meanwhile, the Central Bank of Brazil has chosen nine partners to help develop a digital real, Brazil’s central bank digital currency (CBDC).
Among the partners are crypto exchange Mercado Bitcoin, Santander Brasil, Itaú Unibanco and Aave, a decentralized finance (DeFi) platform.
Central Bank of Brazil Selects Partners to Assist With CBDC (coindesk.com)
Also this week, the Swiss city of Lugano has announced today that it will recognize cryptocurrencies as legal tender. According to Michele Foletti, the mayor of the City of Lugano, Bitcoin (BTC), Tether (USDT), and Lugano’s own LVGA Points token will be recognized as de-facto currencies.
Switzerland aims to become the next crypto utopia as Lugano makes Bitcoin and USDT legal tender | CryptoSlate
So in summary, Central Banks are moving cautiously down the path to actually building something, in the meantime we are seeing more evidence of the political class getting more comfortable with crypto and stablecoins.
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Alan Scott is an expert in the FX market and has been working in the domain of stablecoins for many years. Twitter @Alan_SmartMoney
We have a self imposed constraint of 3 news stories per week because we serve busy senior Fintech leaders who just want succinct and important information.
For context on stablecoins please read this introductory interview with Alan “How stablecoins will change our world” and read articles tagged stablecoin in our archives.
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