Definition
• A digital form of a nation’s fiat money, issued and fully backed by the central bank, legal tender in digital form.

Two main design choices
• Wholesale CBDC – restricted to financial institutions for interbank settlement (e.g., Project Jasper, m-Bridge).
• Retail CBDC – available to households and businesses for everyday payments (e.g., e-CNY, Sand Dollar).

Technology options
• Account-based (traditional database, identity tied to an account).
• Token-/value-based (digital bearer instrument, can be blockchain or non-blockchain).
• Hybrid or intermediated models (private sector wallets, central bank core ledger).

Core motivations
• Maintain monetary sovereignty in the face of private stablecoins and foreign CBDCs.
• Improve payment efficiency, reduce cash handling costs, and foster financial inclusion.
• Strengthen anti-money-laundering and tax compliance with programmable oversight.
• Enable real-time, 24/7, low-cost domestic and cross-border payments.

Risks & challenges
• Bank disintermediation (flight of retail deposits from commercial banks).
• Privacy vs. surveillance trade-offs.
• Cyber-security and operational resilience.
• International monetary sovereignty conflicts and “digital dollarization.”
• Technology lock-in and high transition costs.

Policy design levers
• Caps on holdings or tiered remuneration to limit deposit flight.
• Privacy tiers (anonymity for small amounts, full KYC for large).
• Interoperability with existing payment rails and future cross-border platforms.
• Offline capability to replicate cash resilience.

Global status (mid-2024)
• 11 jurisdictions fully live (Bahamas, Nigeria, Eastern Caribbean, Jamaica, etc.).
• 20+ pilots, including China (largest-scale pilot, 260 million wallets), India, Eurozone (Digital Euro), Brazil (Drex).
• 130+ jurisdictions researching or developing, covering 98% of global GDP.