According to an article published today in Telegraph.co.uk Bank of England is pondering the launch of a digital cryptocurrency, linked to the pound.
A Bank of England-issued digital currency would potentially allow British citizens to keep their money - in digital form - with the central bank itself, dispensing with the need for a retail bank. Big-ticket transactions, such as buying a house, could happen in nanoseconds.
I'm seeing more and more of these news and I'm a bit confused, to be honest.
The use of blockchain technology doesn't necessarily mean we're talking about a decentralized cryptocurrency. All the state-owned banks are in fact talking about a centralized, permission-based ledger, which is something completely different from what Bitcoin, Ethereum and Steem are.
I'm happy to see blockchain adoption increased, but it's not the technology itself that sits at the core of Bitcoin-like ecosystems, but the permissionless nature of these ledgers, the fact that they are decentralized and not "owned" by anyone.
The more banks will announce their own "crypto-currencies pegged to the USD, EUR or GBP", the more skeptic will I be towards these projects.
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