From escalating energy prices, inflation, and even black swans, so many events appear to be converging towards an ominous event.
Yet, despite all of these things, the Fed has maintained its stance that it could see up to three rate cuts this year.
And so, stocks continue to climb.
For years, we have been telling you that, despite all the negativity, investing in stocks is an easy bet.
When there is so much liquidity in the system, money has to be deployed.
We called it the new financial economy.
And it’s only just begun.
So, while everyone is talking about the recent Baltimore Bridge collapse, which saw a massive container ship, filled with lots of Chinese goods, lose power and run straight into the center column of the Baltimore bridge, something else is quietly happening.
Something massive.
And just like the goods coming from China, China is leading the way.
Central Bank Digital Currency (CBDC)
In 2022, we told you about the launch of China’s CBDC pilot program.
A year later, in October 2023, China introduced the digital yuan app to foreigners – allowing foreigners, for the first time, to use mobile CBDC wallets.
The mobile app simplifies the sign-up process for foreigners, requiring only a mobile phone number for registration, and is currently available in 210 countries.
Instead of swapping dollars (or whatever currency) for yuan when shopping, users can simply add credit to their accounts by linking a Visa or Mastercard or visiting a local bank or kiosk.
This convenience is the first significant step in encouraging the use of CBDCs – not just for Chinese citizens but globally.
Today, there are 260 million wallets in 25 cities, making China’s project the largest CBDC pilot in the world.
Among the many goals of CBDC, such as Big Brother surveillance, China is also encouraging its use so that nations can bypass the global reserve currency, the US dollar, in international trade.
Recall our Letter, “A New Global Currency is Live,” from November 2022:
“China’s next step in de-dollarizing its trading partners is having a first-mover advantage in CBDCs.
Last week, China successfully completed a 40-day trial using its digital currency to settle cross-border transactions with Hong Kong, Thailand, and the United Arab Emirates. The trial processed over 160 payments worth $22 million – all in real-time.
That’s right – no more waiting days to clear through SWIFT.
Those transactions came through the so-called “mCBDC bridge.“
This system was initiated by the same countries that participated in the e-yuan trial and was designed to settle real-time payments in CBDCs without using correspondent banks.”
And just because you haven’t heard much about Project mBridge since then, don’t think it went away.
In October 2023, a new brochure was created for mBridge that suggests it is going to start accepting new participants:
Who could some of these new participants be?
A Gathering of Elites
In December 2023, Singapore’s financial authority announced details of new initiatives to ‘expand its financial cooperation’ with Chinese authorities, including a cross-border pilot program involving the retail use of China’s CBDC.
“Following the signing of a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) on digital finance cooperation in 2020 between MAS and the Digital Currency Institute, People’s Bank of China (PBCDCI), MAS and PBCDCI are embarking on a pilot that will allow travelers from both countries to use e-CNY for tourism spending in Singapore and China. This will enhance convenience for travelers when making purchases during their overseas travel.”
While China continues to expand its partners, it certainly isn’t alone in the CBDC venture.
On March 14, 2024, the Hong Kong Monetary Authority launched the second phase of its CBDC pilot, the digital Hong Kong dollar (e-HKD).
Via the Hong Kong Monetary Authority:
“The Hong Kong Monetary Authority (HKMA) today (14 March) announced the launch of Phase 2 of the e-HKD Pilot Programme, with a view to further exploring innovative use cases for an e-HKD in Hong Kong.
The HKMA completed Phase 1 of the e-HKD Pilot Programme in October 2023 and had studied domestic retail use cases in various areas such as programmable payments, settlement of tokenised assets, and offline payments.
Building on the success and experience of Phase 1, the next phase will delve deeper into select pilots from Phase 1 where an e-HKD could add unique value, namely programmability, tokenisation and atomic settlement, as well as explore new use cases that have not been covered in the previous phase.”
Atomic settlement is the process of instantly and simultaneously exchanging one asset for another in a digital currency transaction. The idea is to ensure that both parties involved in the trade receive their respective assets simultaneously, eliminating counterparty risk and the need for intermediaries.
In other words, atomic settlement allows for the direct transfer of CBDCs between parties without needing a central clearinghouse or a third-party settlement system.
Theoretically, this should result in faster, more secure, and more efficient transactions.
But there’s a catch.
The concept of atomic settlement is closely related to the idea of “programmable money,” which allows for the creation of smart contracts that can automatically execute transactions based on predefined conditions.
While this opens up possibilities for more complex financial instruments and services to be built on top of CBDCs, it could also allow things such as “expiring” money.
Via Our Letter, “The New Digital Currency“:
“Once fiat money enters the economy, there’s very little a central bank can do. While they can print money at will, they have no say in how that money is distributed or used.
A CBDC turns this banking model upside down.
…CBDC tokens can be distributed directly to people. And the issuer has the ability to pre-program them to bind the recipient to certain rules.
For example, a CBDC token could have an expiration date or limitations on where it can be spent (think expiring food stamps).
Even more controlling, they can do it AFTER the token has been pushed out into circulation.
In other words, every token you might hold in your digital wallet, a savings account, or a “digital 401k” could be taken away at the issuer’s will—or in this case, Washington’s.”
But that’s not all.
For this second phase, the pilot will establish a new sandbox to “facilitate the study of interoperability and interbank settlement between e-HKD and other forms of tokenized money.”
Recall our previous Letter, where we talked about the term interoperable.
“It’s near impossible to have a one-world government, often called New World Order, despite what many alarmists may have you believe.
However, if you can comprise numerous ostensibly separate systems, all meticulously designed to be fully “interoperable,” then you don’t need to have a one-world government to implement global policy.
You just need something that consists of a single unified healthcare system, identity database, and/or digital currencies – all of which are in the works.”
To learn about the things that are “in the works,” make sure to go back and visit that Letter or watch the video here.
If you think these are just “tests,” think again.
On March 12, 2024, the HKMA also announced the launch of a stablecoin sandbox to allow interested institutions to test the issuance of stablecoins—a type of cryptocurrency whose value is pegged to another asset class, say, gold or the US dollar.
Hong Kong is a massive financial hub for the world.
But, again, they aren’t the only ones aggressively pursuing CBDCs.
A week later, on March 23, 2024, the UAE began the launch of an aggressive CBDC program.
“The Central Bank of UAE (CBUAE) jointly held a signing ceremony with G42 Cloud and R3 to mark the commencement of the implementation of the CBUAE Central Bank Digital Currency (CBDC) Strategy…
…Following several successful CBDC initiatives including Project “Aber” with the Saudi Central Bank in 2020, which confirmed the possibility of using a digital currency issued by two central banks to settle cross borders payments and was awarded the Global Impact Award by Central Banking Magazine, in addition to the significant accomplishment of the first real-value cross-border CBDC pilot under the “mBridge” Project with the Hong Kong Monetary Authority, the Bank of Thailand, the Digital Currency Institute of the People’s Bank of China and the Bank for International Settlements in 2022, the CBUAE is now ready for entering into the next major milestone of the CBDC journey and implementing its CBDC Strategy.
The first phase of CBUAE’s CBDC Strategy, which is expected to complete over the next 12 to 15 months; comprises three major pillars, the soft launch of mBridge to facilitate real-value cross-border CBDC transactions for international trade settlement, proof-of-concept work for bilateral CBDC bridges with India, one of the UAE’s top trading partners and finally, proof-of-concept work for domestic CBDC issuance covering wholesale and retail usage.”
Of course, it’s not just Asian countries pursuing CBDCs.
The West is, too.
The Digital Euro
Earlier this year, in January 2024, the European Central Bank announced the development of the “digital euro rulebook”.
Via Coingeek.com:
“The ECB is now inviting applications for seven new workstreams, which will cover minimum user experience (UX) standards; certification and approval framework; risk management; interactions between payment and acceptance solutions of individual and business users; interactions between individual users and their intermediaries; interactions between business users and their intermediaries; and interactions between digital euro service platform and intermediaries.
The ECB stated that once complete, the draft rulebook would be “sufficiently flexible to accommodate any future adjustments and will be updated in accordance with the outcome of the digital euro legislative process.”
It went on to note that the ECB’s Governing Council would make the final decision on whether to issue a digital euro CBDC, which would only be made “after the legislative act has been adopted.”
Meanwhile, on March 20, 2024, Sweden’s Central Bank released its final report on its own CBDC pilot, the digital krona program.
Via Yahoo Finance:
“Sweden’s central bank, the Riksbank, has concluded its digital krona pilot project and released its final report, which primarily focuses on the offline functionality and user experience. In its fourth and final report on the e-krona, the central bank explored an alternative model for offline retail transactions. The initial model stored offline transaction information on mobile phones.
The report examined four specific use cases: funding and defunding the payment instrument, offline payments at point-of-sale (POS) terminals using near-field communication, offline transfers between two cards, and imposing limitations on card balances and transaction numbers.
The central bank is now considering the implementation of a “shadow wallet” within the online system and a payment card, both of which were already part of the system’s design. The payment card would serve as the payment instrument and keep track of offline changes to account balances.
…Although the e-krona pilot project has concluded, the Riksbank expressed its commitment to continued research on CBDCs, should legislation be enacted to introduce such a digital currency in Sweden.”
So, while the media has you focused on the Baltimore Bridge and P-Diddy, central banks around the world are quietly and aggressively pursuing the use of CBDCs.
In fact, according to the Atlantic Council’s CBDC tracker:
- 134 countries & currency unions, representing 98% of global GDP, are exploring a CBDC. In May 2020, that number was only 35. Currently, 68 countries are in the advanced phase of exploration—development, pilot, or launch.
- 19 of the Group of 20 (G20) countries are now in the advanced stages of CBDC development. Of those, eleven countries are already in the pilot stage. This includes Brazil, Japan, India, Australia, South Korea, South Africa, Russia, and Turkey.
- 3 countries have fully launched a CBDC—the Bahamas, Jamaica and Nigeria. The Eastern Caribbean Currency Union—consisting of 8 countries—halted availability of DCash due to technical issues and is developing a new pilot.
- There is a new high of 36 ongoing CBDC pilots, including the digital euro. The European Central Bank (ECB) is now in the preparation phase, conducting practical tests with some transactions being settled in a controlled environment. The digital euro is in a 2-year preparation stage, ending in 2025.
- In every country with an advanced retail CBDC project, CBDCs are intermediated, meaning they are distributed through banks, financial institutions, and payments service providers. In China, there is also an option for a direct CBDC—which can be accessed through a central bank application.
- Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa—the founding members of BRICS—are in the pilot phase of CBDC exploration. Several of the new members—Saudi Arabia, Iran and the UAE—are also exploring cross-border wholesale CBDCs. Since last year, BRICS has actively promoted developing an alternate payments system to the dollar.
- Since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and the resulting G7 sanctions response, wholesale CBDC developments have doubled. There are currently 13 cross-border wholesale CBDC projects, including mBridge, which connects China, Thailand, the UAE, and Hong Kong, and will enter a new phase, expanding to 11 more countries this year.
- As the largest CBDC pilot in the world, China’s digital yuan (e-CNY) reaches 260 million wallets across 25 cities. Since 2022, it has been used in a range of settings, from transit and healthcare to buying crude oil. In 2024, the pilot is focused on optimizing overseas tourist use and expanding cross-border applications of e-CNY.
But that’s not all.
Just this past week, on March 25, 2024, SWIFT, the current global leader in processing financial transactions, published their findings on “Seamless Introduction of CBDCs for Cross-Border Transactions”:
- Collaborative experiments with 38 global institutions demonstrate new use cases for Swift solution across digital trade, securities and foreign exchange
- Swift solution could enable financial institutions to easily incorporate CBDCs and other digital assets into common business practices
- Connector can interlink multiple networks and could lead to automated trade flows and unlock growth in tokenisation”
More importantly:
“…Interoperability is critical to Swift’s strategy for instant and frictionless transactions. The cooperative has focused its innovation agenda on interoperability between digital currencies and tokenised assets to overcome the potential risk of fragmentation, caused by the development of digital currencies on different technologies and with different standards and protocols. Swift’s solution has already been shown to enable cross-border transfers and connect CBDCs on different networks with each other, as well as with fiat currencies.”
As we wrote in our past Letter, “Why You Need to Act Now“, interoperability is the key word when it comes to digital currencies.
If the currencies of the 134 countries & currency unions, which represent 98% of global GDP, are all collectively interoperable, isn’t that the same as having one global currency?
Call it a global currency. Call it a One World Government. Call it the New World Order.
Regardless of what you call it, it’s coming.
This is the gathering of the elites.
“The angel said to the women, ‘Do not be afraid, for I know that you are looking for Jesus, who was crucified. He is not here; he has risen, just as he said. Come and see the place where he lay.'” – Matthew 28:5-6
Seek the truth and be prepared,
Carlisle Kane
Thank you for this. Obviously, the pain of this is going to hit the middle class (a 2 class system is their goal), but won’t they need a ‘crisis’ to bring this in. Also, have you a guess as to when this will all come down – pre-November or post?
U are using the WORD ,MONEY, when u should be teaching us the difference between ” CURRENCY and MONEY” SEE DEFINITION of MONEY ,
“When there is so much liquidity in the system, money has to be deployed.”
“when currency has to be deployed”
so from my opinion, the world moving to CBDC is just a ” upgrade” for the governments monetary system , fiat currency to another form of digital Fiat , that once investors realize this, best to move to go real estate with TITLE or possible gold , silver , something that represents intrinsic VALUE, more people need to know what a crazy corrupt dollar system we are in
A must & innovative idea for Canada to join the Digital Dollar revolution but as another option to our monetary system. Imagine if power to our grid were to fail or be hijacked or bombed or inoperable for just a few days, it would mean chaos for many to get things done or their lives in order. We can argue that today we have already gone digital. Cash hasn’t been king for a long time. Many of us don’t use cash, relying instead on debit or credit cards, or even our phones to pay for goods and services. Would this change if the BoC introduced a cyber–Canadian dollar? Would we want to have a financial system that consists solely of bits and bytes? I suspect the digital currency may be more of another financial vehicle or path rather than the end of money. Thanks for listening .. dc