Several countries around the world are currently working on implementing and piloting their own digital currencies. In 2020, Japan also announced its intentions to launch a central bank digital currency, the digital yen. After a few years, Japan has finally made a serious announcement in this area – the country’s central bank will launch a digital currency pilot program in April, within the framework of which the possibilities of using the digital yen will be evaluated.
The CEO of the Bank of Japan, Shinichi Uchida, informed that the pilot program has two goals. First, to examine the technical feasibility of launching a digital yen. Second, use the technology skills and insights of private companies to develop a central bank digital currency ecosystem. The move to create the program comes after two years of experiments by the Bank of Japan with the digital yen. Apparently, experiments have proven that it is at least worth trying to advance the idea of launching it.
At the same time, the bank has emphasized that, as part of the pilot program, real transactions between retailers and consumers using the digital yen are not planned yet. It will be more of a study on the possibilities of using the currency, in which both Japanese companies and major banks will participate.
