CBDC Aurum | Benedicte Nolens, BIS | DigFin VOX 43

Benedicte Nolens is head of the Hong Kong Innovation Hub at the Bank of International Settlements. Her team has just released technical details for the workings of retail and wholesale central-bank digital currencies: digital cash. The project is called “Aurum”, Latin for gold.

Nolens, a former Goldman Sachs compliance head and fintech regulator at the Securities and Futures Commission, is at the forefront of CBDC research in Asia.

She speaks with DigFin‘s Jame DiBiasio about CBDC design choices, why many central banks are going to adopt them, and the particular experience in Hong Kong that can help shape the underlying structure of the future of money, both here and worldwide.

• Timecodes:
• 0:00 – Benedicte Nolens, BIS Innovation Hub HK
• 1:22 – Why she’s excited about releasing Project Aurum
• 2:08 – Do ordinary people need a CBDC?
• 4:07 – The differences between intermediated CBDCs and stablecoins
• 6:48 – The roles of central banks and of commercial banks
• 8:33 – HK’s example of commercial-bank issued notes as inspiration
• 10:03 – Counterparty risk and private stablecoins
• 11:04 – Aurum as a potential model for global adoption
• 13:32 – The tech: how distributed or permissioned is Aurum?
• 15:41 – Crossborder use cases and interoperability among CBDCs
• 18:28 – Private fintech initiatives, what drives change and adoption
• 23:24 – what’s next: pilots, use cases, privacy, financial inclusion