“A thousand years ago, when money meant coins, China invented paper currency. Now the Chinese government is minting cash digitally, in a re-imagination of money that could shake a pillar of American power. It might seem money is already virtual, as credit cards and payment apps such as Apple Pay in the U.S. and WeChat in China eliminate the need for bills or coins. But those are just ways to move money electronically. China is turning legal tender itself into computer code. Cryptocurrencies such as bitcoin have foreshadowed a potential digital future for money, though they exist outside the traditional global financial system and aren’t legal tender like cash issued by governments. China’s version of a digital currency is controlled by its central bank, which will issue the new electronic money. It is expected to give China’s government vast new tools to monitor both its economy and its people. By design, the digital yuan will negate one of bitcoin’s major draws: anonymity for the user.”

“Annabelle Huang recently won a government lottery to try China’s latest economics experiment: a national digital currency . After joining the lottery through the social media app WeChat , Ms. Huang, 28, a business strategist in Shenzhen, received a digital envelope with 200 electronic Chinese yuan, or eCNY, worth around $30. To spend it, she went to a convenience store near her office and picked out some nuts and yogurt. Then she pulled up a QR code for the digital currency from inside her bank app, which the store scanned for payment.”

“China’s Commerce Ministry said it would expand a pilot program for its digital currency to include a number of large cities, advancing a pioneering initiative by a major central bank to launch an electronic payment system. The digital currency pilot program will cover much of China’s most prosperous regions, the Commerce Ministry said Friday: the capital Beijing and nearby Tianjin and Hebei province in the north; the Yangtze River Delta to the south; and, along China’s wealthy southern coast, Guangdong province and the neighboring cities of Hong Kong and Macau.”

“China’s central bank is partnering up with Didi Chuxing to test the use of its digital currency, which could make China’s dominant ride hailing platform one of the world’s first’s corporate users of a government-created virtual currency. The digital currency research unit of People’s Bank of China (PBOC) is working with Didi to apply digital currency electronic payment, or DCEP, on the ride hailing app, Didi said in a statement on Wednesday.”

“China’s central bank has introduced a homegrown digital currency across four cities as part of a pilot program, marking a milestone on the path toward the first electronic payment system by a major central bank. Internal tests of the digital currency are being conducted in four large cities around China—Shenzhen, Suzhou, Chengdu and Xiong’an, a satellite city of Beijing—to improve the currency’s functionality, the digital currency research institute under the People’s Bank of China confirmed Monday, in response to a request for comment. Chinese domestic and state-run media outlets reported on the trials over the weekend. The trials followed years of research by the central bank dating back to 2014. The new currency, which doesn’t have an official name but is known by its internal shorthand “DC/EP,” or “digital currency/electronic payment,” will share some features with cryptocurrencies including bitcoin and Facebook Inc.’s Libra, PBOC officials have said. While it won’t boast the anonymity that bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies tout, China’s central bankers have vowed to protect users’ privacy.”

“The tests are likely to include the participation of state-owned partners. These comprise the “Big Four” commercial banks – the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China, Bank of China, China Construction Bank and the Agricultural Bank of China – and three telcos, China Telecom, China Mobile and China Unicom. The pilots will see the digital currency, dubbed digital currency electronic payment (DCEP), applied in real-world scenarios such as transportation, education and healthcare, Caijing says. Partner banks will be able to design their own trials scenarios for DCEP.”