The global financial system is currently navigating a profound transformation driven by digitalization and the rise of decentralized financial innovations. In response, central banks are increasingly exploring or implementing Central Bank Digital Currencies (CBDCs) as a sovereign digital evolution of fiat money. This study investigates the dual nature of CBDCs, evaluating whether they represent a strategic opportunity to modernize the economy or a systemic threat to existing financial stability. Employing a qualitative methodology, the research analyzes official policy frameworks from the IMF and BIS alongside diverse real-world case studies, including China’s e-CNY, the Bahamas’ Sand Dollar, Nigeria’s eNaira, and the European Central Bank’s Digital Euro. The findings suggest that while CBDCs offer significant benefits—such as enhanced payment efficiency, reduced transaction costs, and improved financial inclusion—they also introduce critical risks. These include the potential disintermediation of commercial banks, heightened cybersecurity vulnerabilities, and concerns regarding individual data privacy and government surveillance. The study concludes that the successful integration of CBDCs is not merely a technical challenge but a social and strategic one. Adoption is heavily dependent on infrastructure, digital literacy, and public trust. Ultimately, the research highlights that there is no "one-size-fits-all" model; the future of money will be shaped by how effectively individual nations balance technological innovation with the preservation of financial architecture.

The paper analyses monetary policy transmission mechanism in Nigeria. Vector auto-regression model is estimated for the pre-reform and post-reform periods. Variance decompositions and impulse response functions are examined to see whether there are any changes observed in the monetary transmission mechanism after the reforms. Different systems are estimated in each period using alternate variables as measures of monetary policy shocks. When compared results from the two estimation periods, we noted that both the responsiveness of prices and output to policy shocks and the magnitude of their forecast error variance decompositions, explained by these variables, have increased since the reforms. There is evidence of the bank-lending channel both before and after the reforms. Of the mechanisms estimated, the exchange rate and lending mechanisms seem to be the most important mechanisms for transmission of policy shocks to both prices and output during the post-reform period.