The Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) is to launch a central bank digital currency (CBDC) pilot project “in the near term” and the Qatar Central Bank (QCB) is also exploring the possible development of a CBDC in line with its wider payment digitisation plans.

The BSP’s project will see the Filipino central bank building “organisational capacity and hands-on knowledge of key aspects of CBDC that are relevant for a use case around addressing frictions in the national payment system”, and follows an initial exploratory study during 2021, the central bank’s governor told an international knowledge exchange event on CBDCs.

The QCB has yet to make an official statement about the potential issuance of a Qatari CBDC, but it recognises that “the direction of the market [is] moving towards having a digital currency” and “it’s still being studied whether we’re having a digital currency or not”, a QCB official told Qatari media outlet The Peninsula.

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