Minutes
Date of meeting: 14 March 2023
Item 1: Welcome
Tom Mutton (Chair) welcomed Members to the sixth meeting of the CBDC Technology Forum.
Item 2: The digital pound Consultation Paper and Technology Working Paper
The Bank of England presented a summary of the Consultation Paper and the accompanying Technology Working Paper, published on 7 February 2023. The presentation covered the proposed distribution model, technology design considerations and conceptual architecture for a UK CBDC, called the digital pound.
Forum Members welcomed the publication of the papers, expressing interest in the proposed technical requirements and metrics. In particular, Members were interested in exploring the privacy, resilience and performance requirements set out in the Technology Working Paper.
Members also welcomed the proposal that a digital pound would be a platform for innovation. Some Members noted that the Bank should consider providing the necessary incentives to promote innovation, alongside the structure to facilitate it. Other Members discussed the importance of uniformity of money in the context of innovation. Some noted that with innovative offerings, like programmability features, it is essential to ensure that users have a common experience across PIPs.
Members also discussed interoperability with other systems, such as bank accounts and other CBDCs. Some Members highlighted the need to enable industry players to plug into the Bank of England’s API to interoperate with the digital pound system. One Member considered the potential for broader use of the API – which would see it being open for industry-wide use, across other payment systems, rather than solely an interface to the digital pound ledger.
Members also noted some aspects of the digital pound which were important to consider in further work. These included financial inclusion, tiered wallets and anti-money laundering (AML).
Item 3: Engagement in the next phase of work on the digital pound
The Bank of England explained that work in the design phase would be more detailed, with a strong focus on exploring the operational and technical challenges of a digital pound. The Forum Chair sought feedback from Members on an approach to future engagement.
There was support for the idea of creating subgroups, which would look to consider specific architecture for the digital pound.
Closing remarks
The Chair closed the meeting and thanked the Members for their contributions.
Attendees
Tom Mutton (Chair), Bank of England
Will Lovell, Bank of England
Danny Russell, Bank of England
Simon Scorer, Bank of England
Shantel Mullings, Bank of England
Stephanie Haffner, Bank of England
Members
Ashley Lannquist, IMF
Bejoy Das Gupta, eCurrency
David MacKeith, Amazon
Dominic Black, Ledgerz
Edwin Aoki, PayPal
Geoff Goodell, UCL
Joshua Jeeson Daniel, JP Morgan
Keith Bear, Cambridge Centre for Alternative Finance
Lauren Del Giudice, Idemia
Lee Braine, Barclays
Mark Shaw, Spotify
Michael Adams, Quali-Sign
Patrick O'Donnell, Mastercard
Paul Carey, Stripe
Paul Lucas, IBM
Richard Brown, R3
Sarah Meiklejohn, IC3
Simon Brayshaw, Motorway
Timothy Moncrieff, Visa
Vikram Kimyani, Oracle
Apologies
Alan Ainsworth, Open Banking Implementation Entity
Andrew Flatt, Archax
Inga Mullins, Fluency
James Whittle, PayUK
Will Drewry, Google