Mexico To Operate Digital Currency In 2025

On Thursday, Victoria Rodriguez, governor of the Mexican Central Bank (Banxico), announced that her institution will issue a digital currency in 2025.

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This "central bank digital currency" (CBDC) will seek to generate means of payment aimed at financial inclusion; expand options for fast, secure, efficient and interoperable payments; and implement competitive features to payment methods.

"We estimate that the final operation process will take about three years and will be aimed at banked and unbanked people, expanding payment possibilities," she said before the Senate Finance Committee.

Mexico's CBDC will comply with three basic characteristics: a means of payment, a unit of account and a store of value. It will coexist with physical bills and coins.

The social benefits derived from the Mexican CBDC could be significant. According to a study released by Merchant Machine in March, this Latin American nation is among the top five countries with the least financial inclusion, after Morocco, Vietnam, Egypt, and the Philippines.

"The Banking Association of Mexico recognizes that 53 percent of the adults in the country do not have a bank account, and 7 out of 10 do not have access to credit," recalled Bitcoin News.

So far, central bank digital currencies have been implemented by the Bahamas (Sand Dollar), China (Digital Renminbi), Sweden (E-Krona), Marshall Islands (Sovereign), and the Organization of Eastern Caribbean States (DXCD), whose CBDC prototype operates in Antigua, Barbuda, Grenada, Saint Lucia, St. Kitts, and Nevis, according to outlet Hedera.