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The MOU aims to provide a framework for closer cooperation between the Philippine and Indonesian central banks to achieve enhance their payment systems and promote digital financial innovation.

The UN-based Better Than Cash Alliance (BTCA) reported that the share of digital payments in the Philippines has risen to 10% by volume in 2018 (versus 1% in 2013) and 20% by value (8%).

The Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas the Monetary Authority of Singapore signed an enhanced FinTech Cooperation Agreement facilitate interoperable payments between the Philippines and Singapore. It will facilitate the linkage of both countries' real-time and QR payment systems, to facilitate instant, seamless, and low-cost cross-border payments. This is a significant initiative given the sizeable remittance flows between the Philippines and Singapore, which totaled 2.15 billion in 2020.

"The governor of the Philippine central bank said in an interview that they are negotiating with various banks and financial institutions to conduct a pilot test of a central bank digital currency (CBDC) in Q4."

"Japanese blockchain firm Soramitsu has reportedly landed feasibility studies for central bank digital currency (CBDC) with both Vietnam and the Philippines. Soramitsu is establishing a considerable footprint in Southeast Asia following its successful implementation of Cambodia's Bakong project in 2020. Last year it also started working with Laos' central bank on a CBDC research project."

The Digital Dollar Project completed a proof-of-concept (PoC) with Western Union, BDO Unibank and Accenture that evaluated the potential benefits of using central bank digital currency (CBDC) for cross-border remittances. The platform leveraged distributed ledger technology (DLT) to simulate the payments infrastructure necessary to transfer digital dollars to Philippine pesos. A decentralized exchange (DEX) provided a market for currency pair exchange to explore potential benefits associated with a decentralized marketplace to improve competition and price transparency. The PoC found that CBDCs may improve remittance processing by settling a peer-to- peer payment in less than ten seconds, a key driver being atomic settlement, which reduced counterparty risk and optimized liquidity via streamlined foreign exchange (FX) spot orders and multi-party settlement.

IBM said at least two major U.S. banks are considering whether to follow JPMorgan Chase & Co.'s lead in issuing a stablecoin. IBM said it is also working with six non-U.S. banks on digital currencies, including BNK Financial Group Inc.'s Busan Bank in South Korea, and in the Philippines, Rizal Commercial Banking Corp., which is expected to issue a stablecoin in the second quarter. The banks are awaiting approvals from regulators.

Philippine boxing champion Manny Pacquiao launched his very own cryptocurrency on Sunday at a free concert in Manila, where he serenaded more than 2,000 fans to drum up interest in the product.

UK-based remittance firm Xendpay is partnering with Ripple to use its RippleNet global settlements platform to allow it to enter new markets like the Philippines, Bangladesh, Malaysia, Vietnam, Indonesia, and Thailand.

Some markets including Singapore, Malaysia, Hong Kong, Taiwan and Japan already have sufficiently high limits. Australia and New Zealand have raised their limits, effective April 9, and the Philippines will increase its limit on July 17. Still other markets are at a more exploratory stage in their deliberations and Mastercard stands ready to support them as initial discussions build momentum for action.

"Through the Grameen COVID-19 project, we obtained deeper insights about the Philippine market and also developed a strong case study for blockchain-powered aid delivery. We made progress in gaining trust and improving the usability of Valora, but need to work with the Celo community to continue to build a robust local ecosystem for cUSD and the Celo Platform. We look forward to future use cases on Celo that enhance financial inclusion and build resilient, prosperous communities."

Google, Temasek and Bain & Company released the e-Conomy Southeast Asia report for 2019, highlighting the most significant industry trends observed in 2019 and analysing the current and future potential of the Southeast Asian Internet economy across its six largest markets (Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam).

Google, Temasek and Bain & Company released their e-Conomy Southeast Asia report for 2019, highlighting the most significant industry trends observed in 2019 and analysing the current and future potential of the Southeast Asian Internet economy across its six largest markets (Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam).

MoneyGram is expanding its debit card deposit service internationally via the Visa Direct real-time push payments platform. MoneyGram becomes the first company in the industry to enable cross-border transfers from the United States using Visa Direct. This service is now available to Spain and the Philippines, and soon to additional countries.

The IMF is encouraging the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas to start exploring the possibility of collecting data from crypto-asset exchanges for macroeconomic analysis, in particular international financial flows using crypto-assets. At the BSP's request, IMF staff delivered a lecture on the treatment of crypto-assets in macroeconomic statistics, based on the latest methodology released by the IMF's Statistics Department.

According to Statista, reliance on remittances and the prevalence of P2P phone payments have led to a steep rise of cryptocurrency use in Nigeria. Almost a third of Nigerians said this applied to them. Recently, businesses in the country have been adding crypto plugins to their phone payment options, adding another way in which Nigerians can use cryptocurrency in their everyday lives. The second and third highest rates of cryptocurrency use in the survey were recorded in Vietnam and the Philippines, respectively. Again, remittance payments play a role in the widespread use of cryptocurrency.

The Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas approved the recognition of digital bank as a new bank category that is separate and distinct from the existing bank classifications. A digital bank is defined as a bank that offers financial products and services that are processed end-to-end through a digital platform and/or electronic channels with no physical branches. Digital banks would be subject to the same prudential requirements applicable to other types of banks with recalibration to be commensurate to their business model and risk profile. https://www.bsp.gov.ph/SitePages/MediaAndResearch/MediaDisp.aspx?ItemId=5617

The Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas's (BSP's) Digital Payments Transformation Roadmap 2020-2023 was approved by its Monetary Board. The goal is to convert 50% of the total volume of retail payments into digital form and expand the number of the financially included to 70% of Filipino adults. The second goal is to expand the availability of more innovative digital financial products and services, enabled by the Philippine Identification System, and supported by the availability of a real-time payment and settlement system.

Southeast Asia's digital economy has remained strong and, adding 40 million people into the online space this year, as usage of digital financial services has jumped significantly, according to the e-Conomy SEA 2020 report by Google, Temasek and Bain & Company. Usage of mobile banking apps rose across all Southeast Asian markets with Vietnam, the Philippines and Indonesia recording the strongest growth rates in monthly active users. Online remittances jumped by nearly 2x, and digital remittances app downloads players such as TransferWise surged 1.3x. https://economysea.withgoogle.com/

Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) Governor Felipe M. Medalla provided an update to the central bank's digital payments transformation roadmap in which he underscored the lack of interest in issuing retail central bank digital currency (CBDC). He was particularly concerned about the potential loss of payments privacy ("of course, [retail CBDC] saves a lot of money in printing [but] the government will actually know more about you than your wife. In my case, that is not dangerous; there is nothing to know about me. But for many people, that is a bit of a concern. So, all of those things have to be addressed.")