Italy Moving Towards Digital Payments

The European Central Bank (ECB) is keen that EU member states engage with the public policy debate around Central Bank Digital Currencies (CBDCs) for the eurozone. In this context, it is reported that the Italian Banking Association is starting a technical feasibility study into using Distributed Ledger Technology (DLT) for a future ‘digital euro’.

There are two streams of work planned and all interested banks are welcome to take part.

The first piece of work is to look at the technical feasibility of creating an effective infrastructure and distribution model. This will be carried out as a collaborative piece of work between ABI LabChain’s infrastructure, which has 100 active nodes across Italy, with the banks that operate using those nodes, and with SIA, an Italian technology company. At the moment the focus of this infrastructure has been as an interbank reconciliation system.