Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell has sent a letter to a congressman on Tuesday that said the U.S. central bank doesn’t currently have plans to launch a digital currency and sees the adoption of something like it difficult in the U.S.
Mr. Powell stated that the Fed is monitoring issues around central bank digital currencies “closely” but continued to say “we are not currently developing a central bank digital currency.”.
Characteristics that make the development of central bank digital currency more immediately compelling for some countries differ from those of the U.S
The U.S. payments landscape is highly innovative and competitive, with many such options available for consumers
In the U.S. context, issuing a central bank digital currency for general use would raise important legal, monetary policy, payments policy, financial stability, supervision and operational questions that need to be considered carefully
Interestingly he mentioned Sweden’s E-krona, which that nation’s central banks said “would give the general public access to a digital complement to cash, where the state would guarantee the value of the money.”. Then bringing it back to the Fed he noted:
While the Federal Reserve fosters the safety and efficiency of the payment system by offering interbank payment services, direct provision of payment services to households and businesses would represent a major change
So although the Fed are still interested and are exploring options it seems they are not ready to implement the technology.
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