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.

Firms frequently overstate digital transformation in public disclosures while committing less in observable investment, a phenomenon known as digital catering. We examine whether digital public financial infrastructure can discipline such symbolic behavior. Using a staggered difference-in-differences design on Chinese A-share listed firms over 2014--2024, we find that exposure to China's e-CNY pilot reduces digital catering by roughly 14% relative to the sample mean. The decline is driven almost entirely by reduced rhetorical digital transformation, while balance-sheet-based digital commitment rises only marginally: the e-CNY pilot is associated with substantially less digital talk, but not with a commensurate increase in digital walk in the short run. The effect operates through lower agency costs and reduced information asymmetry, and follows an amplification--substitution pattern---stronger among digital-sector and accounting-opaque firms, weaker where internal controls and institutional ownership are already strong. The evidence identifies financial-transaction verifiability as a novel source of discipline over corporate cheap talk: CBDC-related infrastructure constrains unsupported symbolic claims without immediately accelerating substantive digital investment.

将实体能源状态转化为货币触发条件，是央行数字货币（CBDC，Central Bank Digital Currency）从支付工具升级为政策工具的关键一跃。本文基于数字人民币2.0的“账户体系+币串+智能合约”技术架构，系统论证了数字人民币嵌入绿电与碳信用验证的可行性。研究表明，境内环境下该路径具备三重独特优势：技术层面的可编程性与实时结算能力、数据层面的主权部门背书与闭环验证、制度层面的结构性货币政策工具与双层运营激励兼容。中国人民银行2021年推出的碳减排支持工具，为数字人民币嵌入气候目标提供了制度先例与数据基础设施。若将碳减排支持工具的资金投放与数字人民币智能合约结合，可实现“资金投放—项目建成—碳减排核验—利息优惠兑现”的全链条自动化。本文进一步明确了“可验证法币支付”与“不可发行替代代币”的制度边界，这不是远景设想，而是技术条件与制度环境共同作用下的渐进实践方向。

Central bank digital currency (CBDC) is intended to boost financial inclusion and limit threats to bank stability posed by private cryptocurrencies. Our study examines the impact of implementing CBDC on the bank stability of two countries in Asia and the Pacific, the People’s Republic of China (PRC) and India, that initiated research on CBDC within the last ten years (2013 to 2022). We construct a bank stability index by utilizing five dimensions, namely capital adequacy, profitability, asset quality, liquidity, and efficiency, using a novel “benefit-of-the-doubt” approach. Employing panel estimation techniques, we find a significant positive impact of adopting CBDC on bank stability and a moderating role of monetary policy. We also find that the effect is greater in India, a lower-middle-income country, than in the PRC, an upper-middle-income nation. We conclude that by taking an accommodative monetary policy stance, adopting CBDC favors bank stability. We confirm our results with various robustness tests by introducing proxies for bank stability and other model specifications. Our findings underscore the potential of adopting CBDC, when carefully managed alongside appropriate monetary policy, for enhancing bank or overall financial stability.

Amongst major economies, China has been taking a lead in the development of central bank digital currency (CBDC), which has generated widespread interest and impact around the globe. China’s CBDC, commonly known as e-CNY, is designed with several distinctive features, enabling it to compare favorably to other payment methods such as credit cards, mobile payment, unbacked cryptocurrency, and stablecoins. A variety of social, economic, political, and regulatory reasons can be identified to help explain China’s active pursuit of CBDC. However, the prospect of success will be affected by many factors and may vary between the domestic and international markets. This paper argues that the adoption of eCNY will likely succeed domestically, but may face more challenges in the international markets. The development of e-CNY seems to have created a catfish effect on other major economies in the race for CBDC. It is not fully clear, however, that the CBDC race will be better explained by the first-mover or the late-mover advantage theory. The CBDC project will have both public and private law implications, and several legal issues warrant particular attention in relation to the legal status of CBCD, the role and responsibility of the central bank, legal remedies for losses suffered by CBDC users from cybersecurity issues and operational problems, and the issue of data privacy and protection.

This article provides a detailed introduction to China’s launching of a digital currency. We conduct a comparative analysis concerning whether digital currency is a more stable and reliable currency than cryptocurrency and investigate whether a digital renminbi (or yuan) could replace the US dollar as a medium of exchange in international transactions. China has gained a first-mover advantage by rolling out a central bank digital currency (CBDC). But the outcome will depend on the US response as well as the future evolution of the US and Chinese economies. Most other articles on this topic focus on domestic use of the Chinese CBDC. But this study is unique in analyzing the prospects of a digital renminbi as a replacement for the US dollar in international commerce.

This article provides a detailed introduction to China’s launching of a digital currency. We conduct a comparative analysis concerning whether digital currency is a more stable and reliable currency than cryptocurrency and investigate whether a digital renminbi (or yuan) could replace the US dollar as a medium of exchange in international transactions. China has gained a first-mover advantage by rolling out a central bank digital currency (CBDC). But the outcome will depend on the US response as well as the future evolution of the US and Chinese economies. Most other articles on this topic focus on domestic use of the Chinese CBDC. But this study is unique in analyzing the prospects of a digital renminbi as a replacement for the US dollar in international commerce.