Malaysia’s Central Bank Exploring the Potential Launch of a CBDC

The Central Bank of Malaysia, also known as the Bank Negara Malaysia (BNM) is exploring the possibility of launching its own central bank digital currency (CBDC). At the moment, the project is still in a “research mode” as the Asian nation is only looking towards “assessing the value proposition” of digital currencies. In an email written to Bloomberg, BNM stated: “BNM is actively assessing the value proposition of CBDC to Malaysia.” adding, “While a decision has not been made to issue CBDC, we have focused our research on CBDC via proof-of-concept and experimentation to enhance our technical and policy capabilities, should the need to issue CBDC arise in the future.” Earlier last year, Malaysia allied with the Bank for International Settlements, South Africa, Australia, and Singapore to develop a proof-of-concept CBDC pilot. Dubbed Project Dunbar, the pilot utilized the Corda and Quorum blockchain platforms from r3 and ConsenSys, to demonstrate the capabilities of blockchain-based cross-border remittances. The goal behind this includes developing a multi-CBDC platform to bring together central banks and commercial banks from over the world for cross-border payments solutions. Several countries have been testing the use of central bank-issued digital currencies. For instance, Thailand’s central bank has planned to test its retail CBDC for the public this year. Similarly, Cambodia has already rolled out its tokenized version of...