The Bank for International Settlements (BIS) Innovation Center and the Reserve Bank of South Africa, Reserve Bank of Australia, Bank Negara Malaysia, and Monetary Authority of Singapore have announced the completion of a prototype platform system.
Nicknamed “Project Dunbar,” the system allows transactions between institutions using a central bank digital currency (CBDC), potentially reducing reliance on intermediaries and reducing the cost and time of processing cross-border transactions.
Rashad Kasim, Deputy Governor of the Reserve Bank of South Africa, said that although multilateral CBDC exploration is still in its infancy, the Dunbar Project highlights the possibility of using multilateral CBDCs for international settlements on shared platforms. The South African Reserve Bank has previously tested a digital currency for local use as part of its Project Khoka, which looks at using blockchain technology to speed up the country’s payments system.
