US lawmakers are moving to protect the country from the potential unwelcome impacts of the global adoption of China’s national digital currency.
Three Republican senators, Tom Cotton, Mike Braun and Marco Rubio, They presented a bill on May 25 to limit the use of the Chinese central bank’s digital currency (CBDC) in the United States.
the bill is called the “Defending Americans from Authoritarian Digital Currencies Act” and proposes to ban the use of China’s digital currency payment system, e-CNY, for US app stores and other purposes.
The term “app store” includes all publicly accessible websites, software applications, or other electronic services that distribute applications from third-party developers to users of computers, mobile devices, or any other “general-purpose computing devices.” senators noted.
According to the bill, Application and software distributors in the US may not support or allow e-CNY transactions or support any application presenting such transactions in the country.
The senators reasoned that Banning the Chinese digital yuan in the United States would help the nation avoid “direct control” and surveillance of users’ financial activity.
Cotton, a well-known proponent of the US digital dollar project, specifically argued that a CBDC could be used to spy on people’s financial activity, stating:
“The Chinese Communist Party will use its digital currency to control and spy on anyone who uses it. We cannot give China that chance: America must reject China’s attempt to undermine our economy at its most basic level.”
“We cannot allow this authoritarian regime to use its state-controlled digital currency as a tool to infiltrate our economy and the private information of American citizens,” said Senator Braun.. “This is a huge financial and surveillance risk that the United States cannot afford,” Rubio said.
China is one of the first countries in the world to pilot its own digital currency; launched its first digital yuan tests in April 2019. After multiple internal tests, the Chinese government has been actively promoting cross-border implementations of the digital yuan, working with the central banks of Hong Kong, Singapore and others.
US authorities have historically viewed Chinese CBDC as a national security threat. In March, another bill also proposed limiting the use of the Chinese digital yuan, as it can be used to circumvent sanctions and compromise users’ personal information.
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