Fabio Panetta: “If people want to pay digitally and we don’t offer them a digital tool, someone else will sooner or later”

The introduction of a digital euro “would strengthen consumer privacy and protect the eurozone from the threat of competing cryptocurrencies that could undermine monetary sovereignty.” The thinking of Fabio Panetta, a member of the ECB board, is taken up by an interview with the Financial Times and confirms the fact that one of the main objectives of the project behind the digital euro is to fight the spread of digital currencies created by other nations and companies private. “If the central bank gets involved in digital payments, privacy will be better protected because we’re not like private companies. We have no commercial interest in storing, managing or monetizing user data “. The recent ECB consultation on a digital euro found that people’s biggest concern is their privacy. But Panetta said the central bank has tested technologies to separate people’s identity from payment details: “The payment will go through, but no one in the payment chain would have access to all the information.” The central bank has also tested forms of “offline payment for small amounts, in which no data is recorded outside the wallet of the payer and the beneficiary”: transfers of up to 70 or 100 euros could be made using a Bluetooth connection between A digital euro “would lead to a fundamental change in the way payments, the financial system and society in general will work”, although, at the moment, “we are still in a transition period, but in 20 years everyone will use digital tools. The digital euro and cash could coexist, but I am sure everyone will use digital means of payment. Programmable products could be created at lower costs. For example, users may decide to make automatic payments for routine transactions, such as paying bills, highway tolls, going to the cinema or parking. “Panetta finally compared the digital euro, which is an electronic version of the money issued by the bank. central, with “unstable coins” like Diem, the digital currency planned by Facebook that would allow users to send money as easily as text messages: “If people want to pay digitally and we don’t offer them a digital means of payment , someone else will sooner or later “.