CBDC
Agustin Carstens: The BIS General Manager Who Called Crypto 'A Ponzi Scheme' — and Built CBDC Infrastructure
BIS General Manager Agustin Carstens has been the most vocal senior central banker calling out crypto's fundamental flaws — while simultaneously running the world's most active institutional CBDC research and experimentation programme.
BIS (Bank for International Settlements)
The BIS Innovation Hub's CBDC research including Projects mBridge and Nexus, Basel Committee crypto capital rules, and BIS's role as the central bank of central banks.
BIS and Tokenization: The Central Bankers' Bank Shapes Digital Finance Standards
The Bank for International Settlements — through its research, working groups, and innovation projects — is the most influential institution in shaping how central banks think about tokenization, CBDCs, and digital finance infrastructure.
Brazil: Latin America's Crypto Legislative Leader and the Drex CBDC
Brazil's Virtual Assets Act (Law 14,478), Drex CBDC, and the policy framework supporting 60M+ crypto users — making Brazil Latin America's most advanced digital asset policy jurisdiction.
Brookings Institution: Washington's Most Influential Voice on Crypto Policy
The Brookings Institution has established itself as Washington's most credible nonpartisan think tank on digital asset policy — producing research on stablecoins, CBDCs, and financial regulation that shapes Congressional and regulatory staff thinking.
CBDC (Central Bank Digital Currency)
A digital form of central bank money issued to the public or financial institutions, distinct from physical cash and existing digital reserves, currently in various stages of research and deployment globally.
CBDC and Private Tokenization: Competition, Complementarity, and Investment Implications
Central bank digital currencies — if launched — will compete with private stablecoins and could reshape the tokenization investment landscape. The digital euro, e-CNY, and potential CBDCs create new risks and opportunities for investors.
Central Bank Independence and Digital Currency: The CBDC Threat to Monetary Autonomy
CBDCs raise profound questions about central bank independence — from political programming of money, to fiscal-monetary interaction, to the surveillance of transactions. The political economy of programmable central bank money is the most consequential monetary policy debate in decades.
China: The World's Largest Crypto Ban and Most Advanced CBDC
China's September 2021 total cryptocurrency ban and its e-CNY (Digital Yuan) — the world's most advanced major-economy CBDC — represent the starkest possible contrast between restricting private crypto and promoting state digital currency.
Christine Lagarde: The ECB President Building Europe's Digital Currency
ECB President Christine Lagarde is the most prominent advocate for the digital euro — championing a central bank digital currency for 340 million Europeans while maintaining a cautious, sometimes dismissive stance on private crypto assets.
Digital Euro
The European Central Bank's proposed retail central bank digital currency, designed for use by eurozone households and businesses as a complement to physical euro banknotes.
Digital Euro Legislation: The EU's €1.3 Billion CBDC Race to 2029
The European Central Bank is building a digital euro — a retail CBDC for 340 million Europeans. The legislative journey, the political battles, and the 2029 launch target.
Digital Yuan (e-CNY)
China's central bank digital currency, the world's most advanced retail CBDC deployment, issued by the People's Bank of China and operated through a two-tier commercial distribution model.
Executive Order (Crypto — US)
Presidential directives that have shaped US crypto policy, from Biden's 2022 responsible development order to Trump's 2025 CBDC ban and Bitcoin stockpile directive.
Financial Inclusion or Surveillance? The CBDC Dilemma
CBDCs promise to reach 1.4 billion unbanked people globally, but programmable central bank money carries unprecedented surveillance and control capabilities. The tension at the heart of digital currency policy.
India: Crypto's Largest Untapped Market, Held Back by Tax and Regulatory Ambiguity
India's digital asset policy — 30% flat tax, 1% TDS, RBI skepticism, no comprehensive legislation, and the Digital Rupee CBDC — creating a market of 100M+ crypto users operating in deliberate regulatory uncertainty.
MIT Digital Currency Initiative: From Project Hamilton to Monetary Theory
MIT's Digital Currency Initiative — through Project Hamilton with the Boston Fed, crypto monetary theory research, and Neha Narula's leadership — has become the most technically rigorous academic institution in US CBDC and digital currency policy.
Peterson Institute for International Economics: Trade Finance, CBDC, and the Dollar's Future
The Peterson Institute for International Economics applies international trade and finance economics to digital assets — producing influential research on CBDC implications for the international monetary system and the dollar's reserve currency role.
Privacy vs. Surveillance: The Central Design Battle in CBDC Policy
The most consequential debate in CBDC policy is not technical — it's political. How much transaction privacy should citizens retain when their money is digital and government-issued? The answer defines the nature of state power in a digital economy.
Saudi Arabia: Vision 2030 Meets Digital Assets — Cautious Digitalisation
Saudi Arabia's digital asset policy — SAMA and CMA regulation, Vision 2030 digitalisation mandate, Project Aber CBDC, and the careful balance between financial modernisation and religious/political constraints.
The Digital Pound: UK's CBDC Journey and Why No Decision Has Been Made
The Bank of England and HM Treasury have been consulting on a digital pound since 2021. Unlike the EU's digital euro, the UK has not yet decided to build one — and the political economy of that hesitation is instructive.
The US CBDC Debate: Why America Banned the Digital Dollar
The United States is the only major economy to explicitly ban its central bank from developing a retail CBDC — a decision driven by political opposition, privacy concerns, and crypto industry lobbying.
Tokenization and Monetary Policy: How Digital Assets Are Changing Central Banking
Tokenization and crypto assets are creating new monetary policy transmission challenges — from stablecoin deposit substitution to tokenized money markets, from CBDC design tradeoffs to the monetary implications of DeFi yield.