馃攳
How China's New Cryptocurrency Could Challenge Facebook's Libra | WSJ - YouTube
Channel: unknown
[1]
- China's central bank plans
[2]
to replace its cash with an alternative,
[4]
a digital version of
its national currency.
[7]
Think of it like cash
but only on your phone,
[10]
a cryptocurrency that's issued
[11]
by the People's Bank of China
[13]
and backed by the renminbi.
[15]
- [Narrator] A new global currency.
[17]
- After Facebook announced
[18]
the launch of its own cryptocurrency,
[20]
the central bank accelerated its work.
[22]
China is already well on its way
[23]
to becoming a cashless society.
[25]
Over 600 million Chinese,
almost half the country,
[28]
already use apps such as Alibaba's Alipay
[31]
and Tencent's WeChat to pay for everything
[33]
from groceries to bike rentals.
[35]
Today the two companies
handle close to 90%
[38]
of China's third party
mobile payments market.
[41]
The central bank's currency will provide
[43]
a new payment tool to substitute cash.
[45]
Unlike Alipay or WeChat,
users won't be limited
[48]
to paying within one platform.
[50]
China plans for its crypto to be accepted
[52]
by any individual or institution,
[55]
just like banknotes and coins.
[57]
If Beijing's plan materialize,
[59]
China could become the first major nation
[61]
to go completely cash-free
and that could reverberate
[64]
across the global financial system.
[67]
- If it succeed, I would
expect that a large number
[70]
of other countries will want
to emulate their success.
[73]
- There is still known
about how the system,
[76]
known as Digital Currency
Electronic Payments or DCEP
[80]
will operate and what it will look like.
[82]
So we examined official
statements and documents
[85]
to understand why China is pushing hard
[87]
into this crypto future.
[90]
This is Mu Changchun.
[91]
He oversees the central bank's
digital currency efforts
[95]
and is the country's most outspoken
[96]
authority on the rollout.
[98]
Since August, he has given a number
[100]
of speeches on China's digital yuan,
[102]
and even launched an online
course about Facebook's Libra
[106]
on a popular Chinese education app.
[108]
(man speaks in foreign language)
[112]
Facebook's plans to provide
its two billion users
[114]
with a brand new digital currency
[116]
spooked central banks around
the world, including China's.
[119]
- They see that Libra could be a way
[121]
of extending American financial hegemony
[124]
into the digital currency space as well,
[127]
say, helping to implement
sanctions and export controls.
[131]
Beijing historically sought decentralized
[133]
digital currencies like Bitcoin
[135]
as a threat to a long standing pillar
[137]
of its monetary policy capital control.
[140]
But then in October,
Chinese president Xi Jinping
[143]
spoke about the important
role of blockchain,
[146]
endorsing the government's embrace
[148]
of the technology that
powers cryptocurrencies.
[150]
- They're looking at this and saying,
[152]
is there some element
of it that we'd like.
[154]
And actually, what they
found is that blockchain
[157]
is an excellent technology for tracking.
[160]
- That could give an
unprecedented level of power
[162]
for any central bank in the
world over capital movements.
[166]
Officials say the digital currency
[168]
will not challenge Alipay and WeChat,
[170]
but it would have some similarities.
[172]
Like WeChat and Alipay, it
will need a digital wallet.
[175]
But unlike the paying platforms,
[177]
it won't require a bank account.
[180]
Instead, commercial banks will
issue the digital wallets.
[185]
A unique aspect of China's crypto
[187]
will be that payments
can be conducted offline.
[189]
So in case of a natural disaster
[191]
when the network is down or
if you're onboard a plane,
[194]
you can still pay as long
as your phone has power.
[196]
And authorities promise a major difference
[198]
will be greater anonymity,
[200]
but it won't be absolute anonymity.
[203]
This patent filed by
the central bank in 2017
[206]
shows that it's researched
ways to track digital cash.
[209]
Marketers won't know what
people spend their money on
[212]
but that information will still be visible
[214]
to the central bank to a certain extent.
[216]
- One of the most interesting
aspects of the system
[218]
is how much data will
the central bank have
[222]
about where things go 'cause
that's one of the largest,
[224]
most important differences
[226]
between digital currency and cash.
[229]
- The central bank calls
this controllable anonymity
[232]
and says big data can help identify
[234]
certain behavioral characteristics.
[237]
Officials say tracking transactions
[239]
will help battle money laundering,
[240]
tax evasion, and terrorist financing,
[243]
which is harder to do
with cash transactions.
[246]
And while the central
bank says it won't spy
[248]
on citizen's everyday transactions,
[251]
experts are worried that
China's cryptocurrency
[253]
will allow greater state surveillance.
[256]
China's central bank is
not the only one pursuing
[259]
a digital state-backed currency,
[261]
but it is likely to be the
first major one to launch it.
[264]
Beyond replacing cash, this could
[266]
internationalize the renminbi,
[268]
and experts think possibly create
[269]
less dependency on the US dollar.
[272]
There's still a long
way before that happens.
[275]
Though most governments are
still weary about crypto,
[278]
the world will be watching
China's experiment closely.
Most Recent Videos:
You can go back to the homepage right here: Homepage