on the crypto
Just as Bitcoin (quotation BTC) continues to gain greater market acceptability, some government institutions don't like it. Turkey is one of them. On Saturday, September 18, Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan declared war on Bitcoin.
Many Turkish citizens have moved towards Bitcoin due to the steep decline in value of the Turkish lira over the past year. Erdogan's comments came at a time when the president was attending a meeting with students in Mersin.
One of the attendees at the event asked if the Turkish central bank was interested in opening up to cryptocurrencies. Responding, the President declared: "We are at war with Bitcoin".
Is a ban on Bitcoin on the way?
It almost looks like Turkey could issue an outright ban on cryptocurrencies in the future. Turkey's crackdown on cryptocurrencies has already begun earlier this year. In April 2021, the Turkish government banned the use of cryptocurrencies to make payments in the country.
On the other hand, the Turkish central bank is preparing to launch a platform while studying the issuance of the central bank's digital currency (CBDC), the digital lira.
According to the central bank, it has already completed the Proof of Concept phase for the CBDC. To achieve this, the Central Bank of the Republic of Turkey (CBRT) has partnered with several local technology companies such as Havelsan and Aselsan. In addition, it is also working with the TUBITAK science and technology center.
Collaboration with local technology partners
As mentioned, Turkey's central bank has already partnered with three large local tech companies. Together these national partners and the central bank formed the “Collaboration Platform for Digital Turkish Lira”.
In the coming months, several tech developers are likely to join this platform. Furthermore, the central bank is willing to invite a wide range of experts to work on this. Of course, the Digital Lira will work on a blockchain-based platform. This will further increase the acceptance of distributed ledgers in the Turkish national payment system.
The Turkish central bank will continue testing for the digital lira until 2022. This will help them assess whether the technology is robust enough for nationwide implementation. It will also help the central bank develop its own CBDC solutions.
A large number of central banks around the world worked on the CBDC project. The PBoC of China led the development with gradual trials of the digital Yuan.
The USA and Europe are also thinking about digital currency
The US Federal Reserve will soon release a discussion paper on the digital dollar. In addition, the European Central Bank (ECB) has accelerated the development of the CBDC. ECB President Christine Lagarde also recently lashed out at cryptocurrencies. In her recent podcast interview with Bloomberg, Lagarde said:
"I think we need to distinguish between cryptocurrencies that are highly speculative, occasionally suspicious and resource-intensive in terms of energy-consuming resources, but are not a currency."
And what do you think of the words of the Turkish president? Has the war of states against cryptocurrencies already begun? Write us in the comments section below.
