Coinspeaker
Brazilian Largest Exchange Mercado Bitcoin Partners with Stellar to Work on CBDC for Brazil

Mercado Bitcoin, the major crypto exchange in Brazil, has teamed up with Stellar Development Foundation (SDF) to work on one of the nine initiatives for the LIFT Challenge Real Digital and explore use cases for a Central Bank Digital Currency (CBDC). The partnership is backed by the Central Bank of Brazil (Bacen) as well as the National Federation of Associations of Central Bank Servers (Fenasbac).

As a result of the partnership, SDF joins Mercado Bitcoin, CPQD, and ClearSale as part of the LIFT Challenge consortium. The latter focuses on identifying the technological feasibility, use cases, and infrastructure for launching Real Digital, Brazil’s CBDC.

According to Mercado Bitcoin, Stellar is perfect for implementing tokenization and payments projects. Its features such as high speed, low cost, security, compliance, sustainability, and simplicity make it a strong foundation for developing a solution that Bacen and Fenasbac are expecting to see.

Mercado Bitcoin CEO Reinaldo Rabelo commented:

“We are in a consortium of companies that have the structure and ambition to build robust solutions for the financial market through blockchain technology. Utilizing the Stellar network will allow us to deliver a complete case for evaluation by the Central Bank.”

Denelle Dixon, CEO of the Stellar Development Foundation, said:

“Stellar’s network is prepared to support Mercado Bitcoin and the Central Bank of Brazil as they explore use cases for the Real Digital’s future. Stellar was designed for asset issuance, and its built-in compliance tools give Mercado Bitcoin a strong foundation to develop a solution with the features that Bacen expects to see.”

Apart from Mercado Bitcoin, Bacen also chose the DeFi Aave (AAVE) protocol and ConsenSys in partnership with Visa Inc (NYSE: V) and Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ: MSFT) to develop use cases for the country’s Real Digital.

Brazil Working on CBDC

Brazil first announced its digital real project back in 2020. The country has over the years monitored and studied different options in a bid to modernize its financial system, and CBDC came out as the perfect candidate considering the rate at which different countries are looking at ways to capitalize on its full benefit. In November 2021, it released the general guidelines for the design of a hypothetical central bank digital currency for the country.

In March this year, the Central Bank of Brazil chose nine partners to help develop a digital real. Notably, as many as 47 project proposals from Brazil, Germany, the US, Israel, Mexico, Portugal, the UK, and Sweden were received. The selected nine projects moved forwards through a bank-managed innovation lab.

Further, the Central Bank of Brazil revealed its plan to run a pilot test of the digital real. It will take place in the second half of this year.

According to Roberto Campos Neto, the President of the Central Bank of Brazil, the country’s CBDC is imminent and will have to ensure global competency. Besides, it will enable traditional banks to issue stablecoins in a regulated channel.

next

Brazilian Largest Exchange Mercado Bitcoin Partners with Stellar to Work on CBDC for Brazil