Digital Yuan Used in $5B of Transactions, Says China's Central Bank

The PBOC also said the central bank digital currency will be compatible with smart contracts.

Jul 16, 2021 at 8:59 a.m. UTC

Updated Sep 14, 2021 at 1:26 p.m. UTC

The total value of transactions using China's central bank digital currency (CBDC), the digital yuan, reached 34.5 billion yuan ($5 billion) by the end of the June, the People's Bank of China said on Friday.

The PBOC also said for the first time that the CBDC will be compatible with smart contracts.
The total number of transactions was 70.75 million, spread among almost 21 million personal wallets and 3.5 million enterprise wallets, the central bank said in a white paper.
Digital yuan wallets will be tiered based on the amount of personal information provided, the central bank said. The tiers will determine transaction and balance limits.
Users will be able to open "least-privileged" wallets by default, without providing any personal information, and later upgrade them to unlock features.
The central bank also offered details on the trials planned for the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics.
Unmanned vans, self-service vending machines, unmanned supermarkets, payment gloves, payment badges, Winter Olympics payment clothing, and other wearable devices will be deployed at the global sports event, it said.
The paper assessed that the basic design of the digital yuan is in place. Authorities will continue existing trials across the country, and launch new ones.
Trials for the digital yuan started over a year ago and were initially restricted to four cities – Chengdu, Shenzhen, Suzhou and Xiong'an – and were accessible only to whitelisted individuals.
They later opened to the public through lotteries in the four cities, and expanded to more cities, including Shanghai and Beijing.
There is no timetable for the launch of the central bank digital currency.

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