India cenbank, banks plan new features to boost digital currency
The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) is working with lenders to introduce new feature s to popularise the central bank digital currency (CBDC), the so-called e-rupee, according to six people familiar with the matter. Retail CBDC transactions are averaging close to 18,000 a day, way short of the RBI's one million-a-day target by 2023 end. The features include allowing digital rupee transactions when a customer is offline and linking the e-rupee to India's popular Unified Payments Interface (UPI), three of the people quoted above said. UPI is an instant real-time payments system that allows users to transfer money across multiple banks without disclosing bank account details. The sources declined to be identified as they are not authorised to speak to the media. The RBI did not respond to an email seeking comment. The RBI has been urging banks to make the e-rupee inter-operable with UPI through a QR code, said two of the bankers quoted above. The interoperabili...