The National Bank of Georgia (NBG) has announced that it will advance its research on the Digital Lari central bank digital currency (CBDC) in a live pilot environment with limited access. Nine companies, including Ripple Labs, will participate in the project and one of them will be selected to proceed to the next phase of testing. In a paper released in February, NBG said it was considering a two-tier design for its CBDC, in which wallets would be provided by third parties.It will be programmable and support asset tokenization. Uses of Digital Lari or GEL include the provision of agricultural insurance and automation of real estate transactions.
NBG reported that it is considering issuing a CBDC from May 2022, but no timeline has been given yet. NBG announced in January that it was in talks with fintech firms to participate in a limited live pilot. Additionally, NBG has announced that it will participate as an observer in the Bank of International Settlements (BIS) project mBridge. Which includes China, Hong Kong, Thailand and the United Arab Emirates. Other observers from about 10 countries will join it.
In addition to Ripple, participants in the pilot project include Augentic, Bitt, Broxus Holdings, Currency Network, DCM, eCurrency Mint, FARI Solutions, and Sovereign Wallet. Each company is characterized by its technology potential, maturity, capacity and eagerness to participate in NBG's venture. Ripple is considered to be involved in CBDC projects of many countries of the world, which is active in countries like Colombia, Montenegro, Hong Kong, Bhutan and Palau. Ripple is in discussions with around 30 countries regarding its CBDC solutions. Ripple's participation in pilot phases with countries like Republic of Palau, Montenegro, Bhutan, Hong Kong and Colombia has been confirmed.
Apart from this, many other countries are also testing their CBDC projects. Recently the Bank for International Settlements (BIS), the central banks of France, Singapore and Switzerland, conducted a joint trial of cross-border trading and settlement of wholesale central bank digital currencies (CBDCs). Similarly, in September, the Central Banks of Hong Kong and Israel also released the results of their Project Sela.
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