Adoption of central bank digital currencies: Initial evidence from China

Abstract

Central banks all over the world are at various stage of developing central bank digital currency (CBDC). Few countries have launched the CBDC or widely used it in the economy. In addition to surveying the literature, which features extremely scarce empirical studies due to data limitations, this paper provides likely the earliest and the most comprehensive empirical documentation of the adoption of China's CBDC (e-CNY) after the central bank launched and actively promoted it in pilot regions using both regulatory power and economic incentives. We find that regions with active promotions for e-CNY plausibly witness more frequent and larger e-CNY transactions, more wallet creations, and greater merchant adoption. However, despite the strong intervention, individual users mostly stick to existing electronic payment Apps and are reluctant to switch to e-CNY. Given the world eagerly learns from China's experiment and China plans to expand the application scope of e-CNY as a general payment tool domestically and internationally with added smart-contract functions, we discuss primary challenges and potential paths forward for the development of e-CNY and CBDCs in general.