South Korea’s central bank, the Bank of Korea, released its national monetary plans in a “Monetary Policy for 2020” report last Friday. Setting its sights ahead into the new year, the report highlights the financial environment of South Korea and briefly, its projected goals for the year, such as increasing financial stability, controlling inflation rates and more importantly, focusing heavily on research and studies to improve the financial system as a whole.
Enhancing payment and settlement services, its infrastructure and tightening security over these systems are emphasized as some of the bank’s priorities for the year.
Like many other central banks in the world, the Bank of Korea also plans to strengthen its research on central bank digital currency (CBDC) and has committed to setting up a dedicated team and also hiring experts on the matter to gain a clearer picture of what CBDC can do for the economy in South Korea.
According to the document, the bank also intends to:
- “Continue to build on the research into new innovations such as distributed ledger technology (DLT), crypto assets and CBDC;
- Oversee the enhancement of security over settlement systems;
- Actively engage in discussions with the BIS and other international organizations, while also keeping an eye on CBDC development at other central banks“
However, it seems that the Bank of Korea will not be pushing out a digital won at the present, according to statements made by officials from the bank earlier last month.
Recently, the Bank of Russia has also begun testing its own stablecoin. However, the bank also stated that the testing is for research purposes only and that they do not have any plans to roll out a digital ruble in the foreseeable future.
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