Two central banks start CBDC test series | BTC-ECHO


A new CBDC test brings together banks from France and Switzerland under the aegis of the Bank for International Settlements.

In the Jura project, the central banks of France and Switzerland are experimenting with digital central bank currencies (CBDC). The financial institutions are cooperating with the Innovation Hub of the Bank for International Settlements (BIS) and a consortium from the private sector.

On June 10th, the Banque de France made the test series public. The focus is on cross-border payment transactions between financial institutions. The cooperation partners are thus testing a so-called wholesale CBDC and none for private transactions.

Consulting giant Accenture is also leading the private sector consortium involved in the CBDC experiment. The banks Credit Suisse, Nataxis and UBS as well as the crypto companies R3 and Six Digital Exchange will be there.

Two CBDC resolution mechanisms

The experiment itself includes, on the one hand, a euro-based CBDC and one that maps the Swiss franc. A “French digital financial instrument” is also part of the package. Because two cross-border settlement mechanisms are being tested.

In the first case, a delivery-versus-payment model is the subject of the test. The partners swap the Euro-CBDC for the financial instrument. In the second case, however, one payment is offset by another. As a result, the two CBDCs change hands here: inside. Banks from both countries are involved in the transactions. Benoît Cœuré from the Innovation Hub of the Bank for International Settlements described the experiments as follows:

The G20 has made improving cross-border payments a priority and has drawn up a multi-year roadmap to coordinate efforts. The experiment contributes to this work by examining how a wholesale CBDC could improve speed, efficiency and transparency in cross-border use cases.

Both the Banque de France and the Swiss National Bank had previously experimented with CBDCs. Both institutions emphasize, however, that the latest series of tests is not an indicator of the actual development of a wholesale CBDC.