Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis has signed a bill restricting the use of central bank digital currencies (CBDCs) in the state, according to local news sources. The governor urged state lawmakers in March to write the bill.
The new law prohibits the use of a United States federal CBDC “as currency within the Uniform Commercial Code (UCC) of Florida.” It also prohibits the use of CBDCs issued by foreign governments and calls on other states to use their commercial codes to institute similar restrictions.
At the signing ceremony for the bill, DeSantis said he had been spurred to action by US President Joe Biden’s administration’s studies of new financial technology. The United States does not have a CBDC and there are currently no plans to introduce one.
DESANTIS ANTI CBDC BILL JUST PASSED THE HOUSE & SENATE
I brought a select few of our members up to Florida’s Capitol to meet with
The Governors Team
The Chief Financial Officers team
The Office of Financial Regulation
The anti-CBDC Bill SponsorsIn order for us to push… pic.twitter.com/vnMQxxVoUF
— Samuel Armes (Florida Blockchain Business Assoc.) (@samuelarmes) May 3, 2023
“I don’t think they would have done it if they didn’t intend to introduce one,” he said. If an American CBDC were to be issued, it would be “a massive transfer of power from consumers to a central authority.”
DeSantis also considered the possible introduction of a CBDC as a threat to cryptocurrencies:
“I think they want to crowd out and remove other types of digital assets like cryptocurrencies because they can’t control them, so they don’t like them.”
The bill the governor signed introduced changes to the state’s currency trading code. “There started to be a movement among the states to really add the CBDC to their Uniform Commercial Codes and this is something that was pushed by many powers to do it,” he said, in an apparent reference to the proposed Article 12 UCC now before the courts. state legislatures. DeSantis added:
“We looked at it and said […] We are not going to add the central bank digital currency to our commercial code, but we also said […] We need to add protections for citizens against this, which is why we will put in the Uniform Commercial Code that CBDC is something we don’t recognize.”
The Uniform Law Commission has worked hard to dispel the idea that it is encouraging CBDC adoption, and has even recently issued a clarification on its position.
John Montague of the Florida-based firm Montague Law told Cointelegraph:
“This bill stipulates that transactions involving a CBDC will not enjoy the usual protections of the UCC, which could deter entities or individuals from conducting these types of transactions with a CBDC.”
He added: “The UCC may establish obligations and alter rights of third parties, even without their direct contractual involvement. Florida has authority to alter this definition.”
The law goes into effect on July 1.
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