After Libra, the e-CNY and COVID-19:the new world of money and payments

Facebook’s stable cryptocurrency, COVID-19, and China’s central bank digital currency, the e-CNY, have caused a reorientation of monetary and payment systems around the world. Ross P. Buckley, Douglas W. Arner, Dirk A. Zetzsche, and Anton Didenko envisage three emerging design choices for these systems, reflected in centralised, decentralised and hybrid models. They predict that the advent of national monetary competition through major economies’ sovereign digital currencies will be one of the defining developments of the next decade.