Montenegrin Prime Minister Dritan Abazović has announced on Twitter that his country is pursuing a digital currency in conjunction with Ripple. Abazović met with Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse and vice president James Wallis at Davos. Wallis is Ripple's vice president for central bank engagements and CBDCs. Abazović apparently had something like a central bank digital currency (CBDC) in mind in his announcement, as he stated in the thread: “In cooperation with @Ripple and the Central Bank, we launched a pilot project to build the first digital currency or stablecoin for Montenegro.” The exact nature of the potential future digital currency …

The Eurogroup, consisting of all the finance ministers from the euro-zone countries, released a statement Jan. 16 on the introduction of the digital euro, after meeting in Brussels. The group meets regularly to discuss political dimensions of the potential digital currency, it said. The statement release coincides with the release of a European Central Bank (ECB) “stock taking” document detailing the progress of digital euro design. The Eurogroup statement addressed the need for the European Central Bank and European Commission to inform the Eurogroup and EU member states of developments in the creation of the digital euro, which is in …

From Terra to FTX, 2022 has given us many weird crypto stories. While investors have been enduring a bear market that saw the crypto industry sink below the $1 trillion market capitalization mark, adoption in the space has been growing, and old mysteries were finally solved. From the incredible short squeeze of a bankrupt company’s token to old anti-crypto arguments used by a major central bank, we’re getting weird with five stories the best fiction writers couldn’t dream up. “Comedic rapper” charged over Bitfinex hack Back in 2016, popular cryptocurrency exchange Bitfinex suffered a major security breach that saw attackers …

Progress continues on the creation of a digital euro, and the European Central Bank (ECB) has documented it in a second progress report that described design and distribution options recently approved by its governing council. The report considered four crucial issues, roughly in keeping with the timeline the ECB set for itself that tentatively culminates in a decision on whether to transition from the investigation to the realization phase of work in Q3 2023. The report outlined the roles of the Eurosystem and intermediaries and established that supervised intermediaries would be responsible for all management and user-facing roles in the …

Fabio Panetta, an executive board member of the European Central Bank (ECB), proposed banning crypto assets with a significant environmental impact as part of efforts to address risks. In written remarks for the Insight Summit at the London Business School on Dec. 7, Panetta said harmonizing taxation around crypto between global jurisdictions could address some of the energy and environment costs around mining and validation. He added that tokens “deemed to have an excessive ecological footprint should also be banned,” referring to proof-of-work assets in a citation. Panetta added crypto markets were often at risk due to their “incredibly high …

The total cryptocurrency market capitalization gained 2% in the past seven days, reaching $850 billion. Even with the positive movement and the ascending channel that was initiated on Nov. 20, the overall sentiment remains bearish and year-to-date losses amount to 63.5%. Bitcoin (BTC) price also gained a mere 2% on the week, but investors have little to celebrate as the current $16,800 level represents a 64% drop year-to-date. Bankrupt exchange FTX remained at the centerpiece of the newsflow after the exchange hacker continued to move portions of the stolen $477 million in stolen assets as an attempt to launder the …

Christine Lagarde, president of the European Central Bank, or ECB, has once again called regulation and supervision of crypto an “absolute necessity” for the EU in the wake of the collapse of crypto exchange FTX. At a Nov. 28 hearing of the Committee on Economic and Monetary Affairs of the European Parliament, Lagarde cited Facebook’s Libra as an example of the ECB’s involvement which was “helpful to stop some of the players” from engaging with crypto firms. However, she said the situation with FTX — involved with crypto assets as opposed to stablecoins — was more about the “stability and …

Máxima Zorreguieta Cerruti, Queen of the Netherlands, said she was encouraged by the work the European Central Bank had accomplished in its efforts to launch a digital euro. Speaking virtually at a European Commission conference ‘towards a legislative framework enabling a digital euro for citizens and for businesses’ on Nov. 7, the queen said a digital euro could encourage financial inclusion among underserved communities by circumventing roadblocks including transaction fees and documentation requirements. According to the regent, a central bank digital currency, or CBDC, in the European Union could help reduce the cost of remittances, but may require policy reforms …

The European Central Bank (ECB) Eurosystem digital euro project’s two-year investigative phase has reached its halfway point. The ECB published a progress report Sept. 29 that looked at design and policy issues that are under consideration or have been decided. The report said commerce in physical stores and online is the biggest use case for a euro central bank digital currency (CBDC). Currently, most digital payment solutions are limited in reach and not of European origin. Thus, a digital euro could harmonize payment solutions and strengthen European strategic autonomy, in line with policy goals. The report said: “A digital euro …

The paths of traditional finance and the cryptocurrency industry have intersected again, with a crypto startup coming to save the iconic Euro monument in Frankfurt. Frankfurt-based crypto startup Caiz Development will provide 1 million euros, or about $961,000, in funding over the next five years to rescue the famous Euro sculpture. Announcing the news on Tuesday, Caiz said that the firm saw a good marketing opportunity in supporting the sculpture by obtaining unique exposure. Through the funding, the firm was able to put its product board next to the 14-meter-high euro sign bearing 12 yellow stars, which represent the original …

The European Central Bank (ECB) needs a wholesale central bank digital currency (CBDC) because market players expect it, ECB executive board member Fabio Panetta told a banking symposium in Germany on Monday. Two options for wholesale CBDCs are currently under consideration. Wholesale CBDC is not a new concept, Panetta said. Eurosystem’s Target2 uses a centralized CBDC, strictly speaking. Target2 is a real-time gross settlement system in use since 2017 that also provides a securities settlement platform and an instant payment settlement service. Despite this, banks and financial market institutions continue to explore distributed ledger technology (DLT), Panetta said. The digitalisation …

The European Central Bank, or ECB, has announced it will be collaborating with five companies for the development of potential digital euro user interfaces. In a Friday announcement, the ECB said it had chosen 'Big Four' tech company Amazon, fintech firm Nexi, Spanish digital bank CaixaBank, French payments platform Worldline, and the European Payments Initiative, or EPI, to each focus on developing a prototype based on specific use cases of the digital euro. According to the central bank, the firms will create front-end prototypes, which will not be used in later phases of the digital currency project. The ECB chose …