Money was weight. Gold pressed into discs, stamped with the faces of sovereigns who believed their authority could make metal eternal.
Coins crossed oceans in the hulls of ships. Paper notes were signed by hand. Every transaction left a physical trace -- ink on ledger, metal on scale.
The vault door was the firewall. Distance was security. Trust was denominated in the mass of precious metals held beneath marble floors.
That world is ending. The last coins are being minted for collectors, not commerce. The last banknotes are becoming artifacts.
Central Bank Digital Currency is a digital form of a country's fiat currency, issued and regulated by its central bank.
Unlike cryptocurrency, CBDC is centralized. Unlike cash, it is programmable. Unlike bank deposits, it is a direct liability of the sovereign.
It is money reduced to its purest abstraction: a number in a ledger maintained by the state, transmitted at the speed of light, divisible to arbitrary precision.
STATUS: IN DEVELOPMENT GLOBALLY