Full article here.
Digital currencies have grown in popularity. Unlike bitcoin, the digital euro would be a central bank digital currency (CBDC), essentially, electronic cash. The aim is to offer consumers an alternative Europe-wide payment option.
After coins and banknotes, the European Commission is now proposing the digital euro, a virtual version of the currency issued by the European Central Bank that could be used free of charge alongside cash in the eurozone.
Digital currencies are popular due to two main reasons:
* a lot of people saw them as decentralized currency, away from the grip of the Central Banks; the idea of freedom in currency appeased to many. The whole concept is against having a Central Bank to control it
* speculation; a lot of people saw them as a get rich quick schema; some won, more lost. The ups and downs of Bitcoin valuation, for example, are not for the faint-hearted.
But coming back to the above paragraph, there is no such thing as electronic cash. Cash is material (banknotes and coins), but most of the currency today exists in an electronic form. Your money in the bank - electronic records. You payments done by using a card - electronic records. Most of the transaction are electronics, and the war against cash is on full speed everywhere. Some countries are already cash free (Sweden) and if you're living in one that it's not yet, well, you can notice for yourself how cash is seen as bad (associated usually with crime) and how making everything electronically is so convenient and the right way to be.
So we have euro, we have a Central Bank that controls it and most of it is in an electronic form. What now?
The Commissioner for Financial Services, Financial Stability and Capital Markets Union (wow! that's a title), Mairead McGuinness, explains this new currency and why we need it. The explanation is on the fringe of madness, and we cannot be completely sure if McGuinness is trolling us or is just insulting our intelligence:
It's such a new concept. People are wondering. So this is the euro, it’s cash. And you know what, you see it, you understand it, but maybe I won't have cash in my pocket. So I want the alternative, the choice to have a digital version of cash. People aren't using cash as much as they used to, and COVID-19 really accelerated that trend. So it's about choice, essentially. Will I use this cash, which isn't in my wallet today, but it normally is? Or will I use a digital version of cash?
Beside the excessive use of word cash (6 times), this is not an explanation, it's just verbal diarrhea. You're using either cash, or an electronic form of payment and that's that. There is no new concept here. New is the brainwashing that is unleashed by this sort of people who have no idea what they're talking about.
The overview of the "digital" euro
The digital euro will be a digital version of euro notes and coins. It will have exactly the same value and can be used in exactly the same ways: To buy ice cream or clothes or to send money for a birthday party - even across national borders.
Now, take a second look above and replace the bullshit (digital euro) with the current form of your euros in the bank account, which is .... aargh... digital?!
Have no sleep, McGuinness explains it further:
...so this is a wallet and actually I have euro cash in this wallet as well. But I'm like, I don't want to break my €50 because I have it for something else. So I might decide to use the digital wallet to pay for the euros, for these drinks...
Well, I don't know for this lady, but most of the people, when they want to keep their €50 bill in the wallet (if they're lucky to have one), they will pull out a card instead. Or a phone connected with a banking application. They've been doing this for a long time, and if you want to call their bank account a "digital wallet", go for it. But it's the same old form, wrapped in new shite.
The non-sense of McGuinness continues:
The difference to a cashless, contactless payment is "It is different because it is central bank money, whereas the other payments are private money. You know what its value is.
Private money? What this woman smoked? Remember Facebook trying out their own currency called Libra? That was killed really fast. The Central Banks won't never allow private money or alternatives to their currencies. Try to bring gold standard into discussions, and see what happens.
So what's the big fuss of this "new" digital euro?
Reading between the lines, we can notice a couple of things:
- the digital euro has 0% chance to convert to cash; even if the cash is under pressure everywhere for a while now to disappear, this is not happening fast enough. Include a new version of it, and you fix the problem in an instant.
- full complete control; being digital, Central Banks has a perfect overview when and where and by whom this currency is used. But more important....
- being fully digital allow it to have another attributes: for example an expiration date, or specific usages. The currency of the future won't be only about value. You will have for example 10 digital euros in your bank account that will need to be consumed for food in one month time. It sounds utopic, but this is actually not a new idea (across the ocean, check out with FED). This will extend the control over the citizens to the full extent. Everything for you will be allowed or denied by the centralized powers (which, read here, it won't be your elected govern).
And the joke?
The joke's on you. Because:
The digital euro differs from cryptocurrencies as it is backed by the European Central Bank and thus its stability is guaranteed
ECB is guaranteeing stability. "Stability". Like in 10% inflation. Or more, it depends on how much printing can be done. Oh, I forgot! There is no physical print anymore, everything is digital. Just add a couple of billions in a bank account and press Enter, easy and convenient.
