The Digital Dollar Project, a partnership created by the Digital Dollar Foundation, released a white paper this week highlighting use cases for a U.S. central bank digital currency (CBDC, or a digital dollar) and proposing several pilot programs for the technology. The pilot programs highlight applications of a digital dollar for various types of consumers, ranging from underbanked consumers to large financial market infrastructure payers.

This week, New York's Department of Financial Services (NY DFS) announced the granting of a trust charter to a major custody and trust company to engage in the state's growing virtual currency market. NY DFS approval ensures that the trust company can provide digital asset custody and other related services to New York customers. Including this charter, NY DFS has to date approved 30 charters and licenses for companies working in virtual currency business activity going back to 2015.

A major American financial conglomerate's recently released payments index, conducted across 18 markets around the world, has shown that 93 percent of people will consider using at least one new emerging payment method -such as cryptocurrencies, biometrics, contactless payment methods and QR codes - in the next year. The report also showed that 40 percent of people intend to use cryptocurrency payments in the next year, while 63 percent of respondents agreed they have tried a new payment method during the pandemic. The report states that digital currencies, biometrics, contactless payments and QR codes are trending as emerging payment technologies as consumer comfort with them grows, with 71 percent of respondents saying they expect to use cashless payments going forward.

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