Australia’s RBA Launches CBDC Pilot with Project Acacia

RBA and DFCRC Lead Project Acacia with Major Banks

Project Acacia is co-managed by the Reserve Bank of Australia and the Digital Finance Cooperative Research Centre. The pilot focuses on settlement assets like stablecoins and bank deposit tokens. Key players include major banks such as the Commonwealth Bank of Australia.

Australia advances its digital finance landscape, with regulators like ASIC and APRA supporting the project. Testing involves distributed ledger technology (DLT) platforms like Hedera, Redbelly Network, and R3 Corda.

Digital Settlements Draw Interest and Regulatory Support

Immediate effects include heightened interest in digital settlements. With various industry stakeholders involved, potential shifts in financial transactions and infrastructure are expected.

Regulatory backing enables real-world testing; the project assesses how innovations can enhance financial markets. Reactions center on the project’s ability to integrate digital currencies in economic systems.

“Project Acacia represents an opportunity for further collaborative exploration on tokenized asset markets and the future of money by the public and private sectors in Australia. The use cases selected in this project will help us to better understand how innovations in central bank and private digital money, alongside payments infrastructure, might help to uplift the functioning of wholesale financial markets in Australia.” – Brad Jones, Assistant Governor (Financial System), Reserve Bank of Australia

Lessons from Project Atom and Global Pilots

Australia previously experimented with CBDCs in Project Atom (2021), highlighting the technical feasibility of linking CBDCs with private assets.

Based on past trends, Project Acacia may lead to wider industry adoption of digital settlements if successful, leveraging lessons from global pilots like Switzerland’s Project Helvetia.