(Finance) – “I am in favor of the digital euro, otherwise I would do another job. This is a path that has been going on for three years and since June last year there has been a proposal for a regulation of the digital euro by the European Commission, and now perhaps Parliament will discuss it in the last session. There are already texts to discuss“. He stated it Piero Cipollonemember of the executive committee of the European Central Bank (ECB), answering a question during the annual congress of Assiom Forex, the association of financial market operators, underway in Genoa.
Cipollone then touched on the topic of intermediation, one of the most critical. “The digital euro will have to coexist with current payment systems – he said – As the regulation is now, the bank will add a central bank euro wallet to the customer’s account, so the bank will continue to see the transactions, as now it does not access if customers switch to Paypal“.
He then provided a practical example: “Suppose I want to buy a bike. I go to the store and choose to pay in digital euro. If there is nothing in my digital euro wallet, the system will transform the commercial bank funds into digital euro, and this will be transferred to the shopkeeper, who if he does not have a digital euro wallet will immediately convert it into commercial currency”.
According to Cipollone, “the safeguards are there” and “the real challenge is what banks and intermediaries will be able to do with this” innovation. The central banker then highlighted that “the digital euro is not just the currency, but there is the issue of public infrastructure“.