Central Bank Digital Currencies by Jurisdiction

Central bank digital currencies (CBDCs) have moved from theory to deployment in several of the desk's twenty jurisdictions. The state of play in mid-2026, by jurisdiction, is roughly as follows.

Live retail CBDCs: China (e-CNY, now in nationwide use), Nigeria (eNaira, live since 2021), Jamaica (JAM-DEX), the Bahamas (Sand Dollar). India's Digital Rupee retail pilot has expanded to several major cities.

Wholesale CBDC pilots affecting cross-border settlement: Switzerland (Project Helvetia, Swiss National Bank with the Bank for International Settlements Innovation Hub), Singapore (Project Ubin, then Project Mariana with the Banque de France), the UK (Project Rosalind, Bank of England). These pilots have moved beyond proof-of-concept and now run on small but real transaction flows.

Retail pilots not yet at general release: the EU (digital euro, decision pending in late 2026 on whether to issue), the UK (digital pound, decision pending), Canada (digital Canadian dollar, exploratory), Australia (digital Australian dollar, exploratory).

For a private client the practical consequences are at present limited but rising. CBDCs do not change the tax treatment of money or the legal status of bank deposits. They do, however, change the architecture of how transactions are recorded.

A CBDC transaction, in most designs, is recorded directly at the central bank in identifiable form. A transaction through a commercial bank in fiat is recorded at the commercial bank but not at the central bank, except in aggregate. The distinction matters for visibility: a CBDC transaction is in principle visible to the central bank in real time, while a fiat transaction is visible only to the commercial bank and to regulators with formal access.

Most CBDC designs include privacy provisions for small-value retail transactions (typically up to several hundred euros equivalent) but full transaction visibility for larger amounts. The thresholds vary by jurisdiction.

For a private client this means that, as CBDCs roll out, the visibility of their non-cash transaction history to the central bank of the jurisdiction in which they hold the CBDC account will increase. The audit reads the CBDC architecture of the jurisdictions in which the client holds significant balances and notes the implications.