Michelle Bowman, Speech/Q&A: Considerations for a Central Bank Digital Currency

Q&A Segment –

Treasury is the Lead on CBDC

“So the US Treasury has been leading a working group to help to further the conversation among the other parts of the administration to have conversations about this. But as I mentioned in my speech, we are very committed to ensuring that we have clear authority to move forward should we be directed and authorized to create a CBDC. And that would have to happen from Congress from our perspective.”

“I think there’s a broad concern about the intermediation or the potential for disintermediation within the banking sector. As I mentioned in my remarks, we have a very strong, very mature, effective and efficient banking sector that provides services broadly to people in the United States and throughout the world. It’s very important that we not disrupt or disable our current financial system because we think a new technology might be more interesting. But certainly the idea and opportunity to think about how those things might interact together is something that we should be thinking about in considering whether ultimately we decide to move forward or we are directed to move forward with a CBDC or not.”

Speech Segment –

“There are two threshold questions that a policymaker needs to ask before any decision to move forward with a CBDC. First, what problem is the policymaker trying to solve, and is a CBDC a potential solution? Second, what features and considerations—including unintended consequences—may a policymaker want to consider in deciding to design and adopt a CBDC? While it would be impossible for me to provide a comprehensive analysis of every issue surrounding CBDC, my goal today is to offer a perspective on these two threshold questions and to conclude with some thoughts about the imperative for future research on CBDCs and the potential future of CBDCs in the United States.”