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Banco Central do Brasil (BCB) has has extended the Drex project timeline into 2025 because the technological solutions tested in the first phase "did not present the necessary maturity to guarantee compliance with all requirements legal issues related to the preservation of citizens' privacy". The BCB decided that it would be inappropriate to advance testing to a pilot phase (where real users are involved) until there is "certainty about the ability to meet privacy requirements". The next phase will seek to incorporate new functionalities, such as the implementation of smart contracts within the platform, so that the private institutions participating in the project will be able to create services and business models on the network, without being limited to those designed by the BCB itself. https://normativos.bcb.gov.br/Votos/BCB/202466/Voto_do_BC_66_2024.pdf

Banco Central do Brasil (BCB) selected 14 financial institutions to test digital real privacy and programmability functionalities through the implementation of a delivery versus payment (DvP) protocol for tokenized federal government bonds between customers from different institutions, in addition to the services that make up this transaction. The BCB received 36 proposals of interest from more than 100 institutions. The testing will involve no real transactions (so it isn't the pilot that the BCB claims it to be).

Banco Central do Brasil (BCB) is incorporating decentralized finance (DeFi) principles into ongoing experiments toward developing ecosystems that use "synthetic" central bank digital currency (CBDC) as payment instruments. Digital asset transactions would be settled in "Drex" wholesale CBDC issued by the BCB within the distributed ledger technology (DLT) Drex Platform. The BCB also plans to speed up its Open Finance tokenization efforts and bring decentralized finance (DeFi) into the regulatory perimeter. https://www.bcb.gov.br/conteudo/home-ptbr/TextosApresentacoes/Ap_RCN_Brunnermeier_3_10_24.pdf https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x27Mz_CdwtI

The Banco Central do Brasil (BCB) is pushing for more time on the rollout of its central bank digital currency (CBDC). BCB told CoinDesk that "according to the current BCB assessment, the conditions for the adoption of a Brazilian CBDC will be achieved in two to three years."

Banco Central do Brasil (BCB) is reportedly partnering with Seattle-based KaJ Labs, to launch the trail of its central bank digital currency (CBDC). However, there's no mention of it on the BCB website, and the Kaj Labs press release makes it sound more like the firm has merely initiated discussions with the BCB. Also, it's unclear whether they're discussing retail of wholesale CBDC. It sounds more like the latter, with a focus on using DLT to tokenize and settle bonds.

The Hong Kong Monetary Authority (HKMA) has established new cross-border partnerships with Banco Central do Brasil (BCB) and the Bank of Thailand (BOT) to explore cross-border payment-versus-payment (PvP) and delivery-versus-payment (DvP) settlement use cases in areas such as trade finance payments and carbon credits. In the HKMA-BCB case the HKMA will link its Project Ensemble central bank digital currency (CBDC) sandbox to the BCB Drex CBDC pilot platform. In the HKMA-BOT case, the HKMA will link the Ensemble sandbox to the BOT's Project San experimental tokenization platform, and test linking the two platforms with distributed ledger technology (DLT) based financial market infrastructures (FMIs). https://www.hkma.gov.hk/eng/news-and-media/press-releases/2024/10/20241028-4/

Banco Central do Brasil (BCB) published a technical report on the first phase of the Drex wholesale central bank digital currency (CBDC) pilot that focused on testing the use of tokenized deposits. The platform used was a private, permissioned version of the Ethereum blockchain. The pilot involved the participation of 16 financial institutions, which were selected from a pool of 36 candidates. The pilot tested a range of use cases, including the issuance and transfer of tokenized deposits, as well as the settlement of transactions involving tokenized government bonds. BCB found a tough "trilemma" between privacy, programmability, and oversight. Advanced cryptography (like zero-knowledge proofs) can hide transaction details to protect user privacy, but this also makes it hard for regulators to monitor illicit activity or even for the system to run complex smart contracts. The next phase of the pilot program will focus on advancing privacy while allowing pilot participants to suggest more use cases.

Banco Central do Brasil (BCB) announced that "DREX" will be the official name of the digital real central bank digital currency (CBDC). The D stands for digital, R for real, E for electronic, and X for modernity and connection. The BCB also released the new visual branding for DREX. On the CBDC logo, two arrows, inside the capital D, picture the evolution of the real to its digital version, while the transition from blue to light green colors stands for the "transaction completed" message. https://www.flickr.com/photos/bancocentralbr/53100738843/

Banco Central do Brasil (BCB) has pushed back the addition of recurring payments to its Pix instant payment platform from October 2024 until June 2025. Automatic Pix will facilitate recurring charges that let users authorize periodic debits automatically, without the need for authentication for each transaction. The BCB also published amended Pix regulations that limit transactions on access devices that are unregistered or that have never been used to initiate a Pix transaction to R$200 and R$1,000 per day. The amendments will become effective on November 1, 2024.

Nine banking industry associations have submitted a letter to the Basel Committee on Banking Supervision (BCBS) in response to its proposal to introduce stringent capital requirements for banks looking to hold crypto-assets on their books. In June, the BCBS published a consultation paper that suggested that banks would need to hold $1 in capital for each $1 of Bitcoin exposure. The letter argues for a more nuanced taxonomy of various crypto-assets and their varying risk profiles that would take into account aspects such as the existence of a liquid, two-way market for some crypto assets.

The Banco Central do Brasil (BCB) has opened the registration period for Brazilian financial institutions  to participate in digital real technical testing, in accordance with BCB Resolution No. 315/2023, published on April 27, 2023. The testing will involve no real transactions (so it isn't a pilot). Its aim is to validate the use of a DLT solution on the Hyperledger Besu platform, evaluating programmability and the ability to comply with legal and regulatory requirements, mainly related to privacy,  as well as its technological viability.

The president of Banco Central do Brasil (BCB), Roberto Campos Neto, reportedly said that the central bank would release Pix's technology to other countries. Launched by the BCB in 2020, Pix allows for instant, free, and immediate payments, and as of July 2022, more than 478 million passwords were registered on Pix. This system has been widely adopted in the country due to its simplicity and 24/7 availability.

The Bank for International Settlements (BIS) published an executive summary of the Basel Committee on Banking Supervision (BCBS) standard on the prudential treatment of crypto-asset exposures published in December 2022. The standard outlines minimum regulatory, supervisory review and disclosure requirements of banks' crypto-asset exposures under Pillars 1, 2 and 3 of the Basel Framework. Internationally active banks in BCBS member jurisdictions are expected to adopt the standard by 1 January 2025.

The Banco Central do Brasil (BCB) published the details of its digital real central bank digital currency (CBDC) technical testing. It will involve no real transactions (so it isn't a pilot). Its aim is to validate the use of a DLT solution on the Hyperledger Besu platform, evaluating programmability and the ability to comply with legal and regulatory requirements, mainly related to privacy, as well as its technological viability. The details include the criteria for selecting the ten participating institutions.

This Central Bank of Brazil (BCB) note discusses the development of its central bank digital currency (CBDC). The main objective is to provide entrepreneurs with a safe and reliable environment to innovate through the use of programmability technologies, such as programable money and smart contracts. In the context of a modern payment system, already available to the Brazilian population, a full-fledged CBDC must enable new functionalities, beyond those brought by an instant payment arrangement. Therefore, the innovation tool for which the BCB envisions the greatest potential is the development of a platform for smart payments.

Banco Central do Brasil (BCB) announced the 13 themes that will be trialed during the second phase of the Drex wholesale central bank digital currency (CBDC) pilots. The first phase involved testing processes such as issuing, transferring and settling digital treasury bonds with tokenized commercial bank deposits with wholesale CBDC utilized for interbank settlements. During the second phase, various financial services will be developed via smart contracts on the Drex platform created by 16 consortia or companies. The platform is a permissioned Ethereum network using Hyperledger Besu. https://www.bcb.gov.br/detalhenoticia/20300/nota

The Basel Committee on Banking Supervision (BCBS) published a working paper on the various risks faced by banks that transact on permissionless blockchains or similar distributed ledger technologies (DLTs). Certain risks stem from the blockchain's reliance on unknown or third parties, which makes it difficult for banks to conduct due diligence and oversight. These risks require new risk management strategies and safeguards. The paper finds that current practices for mitigating these risks remain in various stages of development and have not been tested under stress.

To date, at least three transactions have reportedly been made with the Banco do Brasil (BCB) Drex central bank digital currency (CBDC) as part of its proof of concept experimentation. One was carried out between two private banks (BTG Pactual and Itaú Bank) to test the compatibility and the efficiency of the payment network. The second was between the BCB and a public-sector bank (Caixa Econômica Federal). The third, in September 2024, was an interbank transaction between a public bank (Caixa) and a private digital bank (Inter). All were presumably conducted in the BCB's Drex sandbox.

Banco Central do Brasil (BCB) published a report on the main developments in the first phase of its Drex wholesale central bank digital currency (CBDC) proof-of-concept (POC) work, which took place between July 2023 and October 2024. (None of the Drex POC tests involved real clients or assets, but rather fictitious ones.) The report highlighted the trilemma of finding a solution that balances decentralization, programmability, and privacy issues at the same time, while being compliant to the Brazilian legal framework. I'm still digesting a Google Translate version (it's only available in Portuguese) of the 73-page report, and may come back with more detail later.

Valor Economico is reporting that some of the firms involved in the Banco Central do Brasil Drex (BCB) wholesale central bank digital currency (CBDC) project are reducing resource commitments to it. This is reportedly due to frustrations with the BCB's privacy requirements to hide transaction data from all the banks involved except the one that is executing it, while allowing the BCB to see everything and be able to reverse transaction with a court order to that effect. All this must be achieved without harming the digital currency's programmability and composability allowed by its distributed ledger technology (DLT) based platform.