IMF still pushing CBDCs while continuing to highlight crypto risk

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• Opinion

A recent IMF post was extremely favourable towards countries in Latin America and the Caribbean using central bank digital currencies, while denigrating El Salvador’s adoption of Bitcoin.

The post by the International Monetary Fund suggested that Latin American and Caribbean (LAC) countries were making “significant strides in the introduction of central bank digital currencies (CBDCs).

It cited the four Latin American countries of Brazil, Argentina, Colombia, and Ecuador, as ranking among the top 20 countries in 2022 for adoption of crypto assets.

However, the IMF post chose to go along with the perceived disadvantages of these potential adoptions citing:

“crypto asset adoption also presents numerous challenges and risks, particularly for vulnerable LAC countries with a history of macroeconomic instability, low institutional credibility, substantial capital flows, corruption, and extensive informal sectors.”

On the subject of adoption, the IMF authors pointed out how the Dominican Republic and Argentina had prohibited the use of crypto assets, citing the concerns of “financial stability, currency and asset substitution, tax evasion, corruption and money laundering”.

It was not mentioned that the IMF itself had obliged the Argentinian central bank to insert an anti-crypto clause in its agreement over a recent IMF bailout.

The IMF said that it had carried out a survey of government officials in the LAC region and half of them had replied that they were considering retail and wholesale CBDC options. 

“Most survey participants viewed CBDCs as a means to enhance their payment systems and broaden their access. They deemed financial inclusion and monetary sovereignty as crucial factors in favor of retail CBDC issuance by facilitating the integration of unbanked individuals and curbing currency substitution towards stablecoins or crypto assets.”

However, the IMF admitted that CBDC takeup was “slow” for the ECCU and the Bahamas, and stated that it was for this reason that these countries must promote CBDC adoption and raise public awareness of them.

Opinion

The IMF has a profound belief in fiat currencies, and the dollar in particular. It has spent the last several decades of its existence providing loans to primarily third world countries, thereby enslaving them in yet more debt.

For such an organisation crypto assets are anathema, to be prohibited and repressed at any cost, despite acknowledging the obvious advantages that the crypto industry has brought to finance.

That El Salvador might be having success with its bitcoin adoption strategy must be making officials at the IMF wring their hands with worry. 

Should the IMF be successful in urging some of these countries in the LAC region to adopt CBDCs then it can be expected that their citizens will be utterly controlled and enslaved.

Hopefully citizens will have the education to reject a CBDC, just as is the case in Nigeria, where only 0.5% of the population are using the eNaira as a transaction option, even in the face of cash shortages.

Disclaimer: This article is provided for informational purposes only. It is not offered or intended to be used as legal, tax, investment, financial, or other advice.