Im Euroraum wird die Einführung eines digitalen Euro bereits seit Längerem diskutiert. Die Untersuchungsphase der Europäischen Zentralbank lief bereits seit Oktober 2021 und ging im Oktober 2023 in eine Vorbereitungsphase über. In anderen Ländern wird digitales Zentralbankgeld bereits...

We maintain that the crypto-currency bitcoin is a practical application of what is termed “memory” in the monetary economics literature. After reviewing the theoretical literature on money and memory, we offer a brief overview of the bitcoin protocol and argue that, like memory, bitcoin...

At present, bitcoin is held mostly as a speculative vehicle, little used to pay for goods and services. Its value has been unstable, which impedes bitcoin’s wider use as a payment medium. We explain why the value of bitcoin has been so unstable. Then, we discuss entrepreneurial efforts that...

This paper is a critical engagement with the four design principles for Central Bank Digital Currency (CBDC) recently proposed by Kumhof and Noone (KN). It is argued that the implicit notion of parity underlying KN's analysis is too narrow as it is only focused on the exchange rate between CBDC...

The Bitcoin Market Potential Index conceptualizes and ranks the potential utility of bitcoin across 178 countries to show where the cryptocurrency has the greatest relative potential for adoption. The index utilizes a data set with 40 variables from the following areas: technology penetration,...

The prospect of central banks issuing digital currency (CBDC) immediately raises the question of how this new form of money should co-exist and interact with existing forms of money. This paper evaluates three different scenarios for the implementation of CBDC in terms of their monetary policy...

The first global cryptocurrency benchmarking study presents a systematic and comprehensive picture of a rapidly evolving industry, illustrating how cryptocurrencies are being used, stored, transacted and mined. The study gathered non-public data from more than 100 cryptocurrency companies and...

The rise of virtual currencies, like many innovations, poses legal questions. Most existing laws do not contemplate the existence of virtual currencies. Can existing U.S. criminal law, tax law, banking law, securities law, and consumer protection law nevertheless be applied to virtual...

This paper reviews what cryptocurrencies are, and it frames them within the context of historical monetary experiences and contemporary monetary economics. The paper argues that, as pure duciary private money, cryptocurrencies are a bubble without a fundamental value and that they will not...

The governance of the fiat money system via democratically elected government and financial institutions aims to ensure that all can transact fairly and safely with confidence in the stability and viability of that system in an equitable manner for all citizens. Rawls (1971) suggested that the...