While an increasing number of central banks are shifting their focus from retail to wholesale central bank digital currencies (CBDCs), China’s e-CNY, a retail CBDC, has shown notable progress, despite the country’s already competitive e-payment landscape, where tech giants Tencent and Alibaba dominate.
Currently, the e-CNY pilot programme spans 26 cities across 17 provinces. The digital currency is accepted in most large shopping centres, supermarkets, chain restaurants and even vending machines. Moreover, it is integrated with China’s most popular online platforms, such as ride-hailing app DiDi, shopping app Meituan, travel app Ctrip, and, of course, WeChat Pay and Alipay.
As of July, the e-CNY app has attracted 180 million personal wallet users, with a cumulative transaction value of Rmb7.3 trillion (US$1 trillion) in pilot areas. The digital currency has also made strides in smart contracts, with 346,000 transactions totalling Rmb57 billion as of September.
“China has done a great job promoting the e-CNY,” says Xiaonan Zou, head of digital assets at UBS Group Treasury. “By leveraging popular social media apps like WeChat and TikTok, they’ve made digital currencies accessible to everyone.
