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To help clarify Fintech regulatory positions and move policy forward, French and German regulators have started a variety of initiatives, ranging from novel legislation in France to preliminary expert hearings in Germany. France has paved the way with the "PACTE bill" and a new regime for crypto-asset players. Germany is taking a similar path with a public consultation launched by a cooperation of the Ministry of Finance and the Ministry of Justice in early March.

France will halt the development of Facebook's planned Libra cryptocurrency in Europe because it threatens the "monetary sovereignty" of governments.

The Bank of France will shut down more than a third of its cash handling centers by the end of 2022 as the Covid-19 pandemic accelerates a decline in the use of notes and coins. Operations will cease at 14 of the 37 centers that stock currency and replace damaged notes and coins. The central bank estimates the network would be 40% underused if it remained as expansive as it is now.

"In his survey of forced money law, economist Dror Goldberg hypothesizes that the law's appearance through history is a function of economic and political authoritarianism. Goldberg documents the law's revival under the dictator Napoleon Bonaparte, who imposed a fine of "fine of six to ten francs and imprisonment of five days for relapse." It was subsequently exported to the countries that France conquered."

On June 18th and 25th, the Banque de France successfully carried out a fifth experiment on central bank digital currency (CBDC) with a consortium of actors driven by LiquidShare as part of the experimental program launched in March 2020. The experiment involved the simulation on a private blockchain of the issuance and settlement of unlisted securities and of the settlement of listed securities. Settlements of securities were simulated by CBDC issued on the blockchain. The experiment required the development and deployment of smart contracts so that the Banque de France could issue and control the circulation of CBDC tokens while ensuring that each transfer takes place simultaneously with the delivery of the securities.

The Sygnum Digital Swiss Franc (DCHF), which is pegged on a 1:1 basis with the fiat currency, was used to complete a payment for an Apple iPad at Digitec Galaxus, Switzerland's largest online retailer. Coinify, a digital currency platform provider, enabled the sale to take place. Sygnum said its offering stands out against other stablecoin issuers such as Tether because it is a regulated bank-meaning one Swiss franc is verifiably held as collateral for every DCHF that is in circulation.

On May 14 the Banque de France completed a test of a blockchain-based wholesale digital euro to settle a securities trade with Societe Generale. The French central bank will continue to run more experiments involving sending the digital euro between other banks.

The Banque de France l'Autorité de Contrôle Prudentiel et de Résolution (ACPR) published a discussion paper on possible regulatory approaches to decentralized finance (DeFi). The paper provides an analysis of the structure and risks of disintermediated finance and its various components before formulating different regulatory framework scenarios, some of which are alternative, others complementary. The purpose of this document is to inform the ACPR's positions and to contribute to ongoing discussions, particularly at the European level, on the value of and procedures for regulating disintermediated finance.

The Banque de France (BdF) has kicked off the second phase of experimentation into a wholesale CBDC, with an eyer towards being ready to introduce central bank money as a settlement asset as early as 2023, with the implementation of the European pilot regime. Over the past year, the central bank has successfully completed the first phase of its experimentation program, comprising nine experiments with the private sector and with other public actors, with a focus on cross-borer payments and tokenized securities settlement. Now the BdF wants to get closer to a viable prototype, testing it in practice with more private actors and more foreign central banks in the second half of 2022 and in 2023.

"The Swiss Bankers Association (SBA) has published a white paper on a digital Swiss franc, in which it outlines various designs of "tokenised" deposits on the blockchain. If issued by regulated banks, a deposit token could make an important contribution to Switzerland's future competitiveness and innovative power, as well as bolster its sovereignty."

The Bank for International Settlements (BIS) Innovation Hub Eurosystem Centre, a joint effort by the BIS and all Eurosystem central banks, opened on March 28, 2023. The Centre will have offices in Frankfurt and in Paris, hosted and supported by the Deutsche Bundesbank and the Banque de France. The European Central Bank will coordinate the interactions of the Eurosystem with the Centre. The Centre's project focus areas will be decentralized finance (DeFi), wholesale central bank digital currency (CBDC), cyber security and green finance. Projects include Atlas, which will create an open-source data platform to provide information on DeFi and crypto-asset market capitalization, economic activity and international flows of crypto-assets, and Mariana, which will explore automated market-makers (AMM) for the cross-border exchange of Swiss franc, euro and Singapore dollar wholesale CBDCs.

[On July 8th 2021] Banque de France successfully carried out a wholesale central bank digital currency (CBDC) experiment in cooperation with Banque Centrale de Tunisie. A wire transfer took place between two individuals, in commercial bank money through transfer of wholesale CBDC between the two central banks.

French Finance Minister Le Maire said "a common framework" on digital currencies was needed for the 28 EU countries and urged the creation of a European "public digital currency", without giving more details.

ECB board member Benoit Coeure said Libra has revived efforts to widen the uptake of the ECB-backed TIPs fast cash project, and that the ECB needs to step up its thinking on a central bank digital currency.

This document reports on the work done by an internal Banque de France central bank digital currency (CBDC) taskforce led by Christian Pfister.

The Banque de France is calling for applications to experiment with a wholesale central bank digital currency for interbank settlements.

Denis Beau, First Deputy Governor of the Bank of France, addressed the "What Ambitions For Europe" Stablecoin Conference. Paris Europlace and ConsenSys organized the event this January. Mr. Beau talked about the good and the bad. He outlined three tasks for regulatory authorities working on stablecoin adoption policies.

The experiment consisted in the subscription to EIB-issued digital bonds by investors, for a total amount of 100 million euros. Cash settlements were represented by Central Bank Digital Currency issued on a blockchain. From a technological standpoint, the experiment required the development and deployment of smart contracts under secured conditions, so that the Banque de France could issue and control the circulation of CBDC tokens and so that CBDC transfer occurred simultaneously with the delivery of securities tokens to the investors' portfolio, in a Delivery versus Payment. The experiment was conducted in cooperation with the members of a banking syndicate composed of Goldman Sachs International, Santander and Société Générale.

This Banque de France paper considers the motives, modalities, and possible consequences of retail and wholesale central bank digital currency issuance.

The hype around initial coin offerings may have quieted down in the States, but France seems to be taking a newfound interest. On Dec. 17th, France's financial regulator, the Autorité des Marchés Financiers, granted the country's first approval for an ICO application.