Bank of France (representing the Eurosystem), Bank of Japan, Bank of Korea, Bank of Mexico, Swiss National Bank, Bank of England and the Federal Reserve Bank of New York will seek to work in partnership with a large group of private financial firms convened by the Institute of International Finance (IIF). 

Project Agorá builds on the unified ledger concept proposed by the BIS and will investigate how tokenised commercial bank deposits can be "seamlessly integrated with tokenised wholesale central bank money in a public-private programmable core financial platform."

According to BIS, this could "enhance the functioning of the monetary system and provide new solutions using smart contracts and programmability, while maintaining its two-tier structure." 

The BIS will issue a call for expressions of interest to private financial institutions to join Project Agorá. 

“Today’s announcement of co‑ordinated international action on cryptoassets is a major step forward, marking another important milestone towards the widespread and co-ordinated approach to combat tax evasion through greater transparency and exchange of information,” Secretary-General Cormann said.

“We strongly welcome the extensive support being shown for quick action to make the international exchange of information collected under the OECD standard on cryptoasset reporting a reality. The international community can count on the OECD and the Global Forum on Transparency and Exchange of Information for Tax Purposes to ensure that the tax transparency architecture remains both up-to-date and effective going forward.”

The Crypto-Asset Reporting Framework (CARF) is a key component of the International Standards for Automatic Exchange of Information in Tax Matters developed by the OECD under a G20 mandate. It provides for the automatic exchange of tax-relevant information on cryptoassets and comes against the backdrop of a rapid adoption of the use of cryptoassets for a wide range of investment and financial uses.

The project tested the cross-border trading and settlement of wholesale central bank digital currencies (wCBDCs) between financial institutions, using new decentralised finance (DeFi) technology concepts on a public blockchain.

The project’s proof of concept successfully tested the cross-border trading and settlement of hypothetical euro, Singapore dollar and Swiss franc wCBDCs between simulated financial institutions. The process relied on three elements: 

• A common technical token standard provided by a public blockchain to facilitate exchange and interoperability between the different currencies.
• Bridges for the seamless transfer of wCBDCs between different networks.
• An Automated Market Maker (AMM), which is a specific type of decentralized exchange to trade and settle spot FX transactions automatically. 

These changes, which will apply from 1 January 2024, are also intended to anticipate the transition to the Markets in Crypto-Assets Regulation (MiCA) by adjusting the provisions relating to licenced DASPs.

The changes have two main objectives:

• to incorporate into the General Regulation and its policy the provisions applicable to DASPs subject to "enhanced" registration. This regime will become mandatory from 1 January 2024 for new players wishing to provide the four services subject to mandatory registration;
• align the requirements for DASPs licence with those for European authorisation for cryptoasset service providers (CASPs) under the MiCA Regulation, and allow a fast track procedure to be implemented towards CASP authorisation.

The Law of 9 March 2023 (DDADUE) on various provisions for adaptation to European Union law, introduced an "enhanced" registration regime that will be mandatory from 1 January 2024 for new players wishing to provide the four digital asset services subject to mandatory registration (custody, buying/selling for legal tender, trading of digital assets for other digital assets, operation of a trading platform for digital assets). The AMF has updated its Position-Recommendation DOC-2020-07 (Questions and Answers on the DASP regime) to clarify the transitional provisions relating to this new regime.

DASPs that have already obtained "simple" registration before 1 January 2024 benefit from a grandfather clause and will continue to be subject to the registration requirements applicable prior to 1 January 2024.

In its updated policy, the AMF sets out the transitional provisions provided for under Article 8 of the DDADUE Law (questions 3.1 and 3.2).

DASPs that file an application for registration before 1 July 2023, which the AMF deems to be complete, will be subject to a "simple" registration procedure. The application is considered complete if all the required documents have been provided, and if the information is accurate and of high quality.

Persons who have not submitted a registration file deemed complete by the AMF by 1 July 2023 must complete and update their file to comply with the provisions of the "enhanced" DASP registration.

A DASP that has already been registered as a simple DASP applying for an extension to a new service on or after 1 July 2023 will be subject to the provisions of "enhanced" registration for all the services it provides, including those for which it already had simple registration.

These changes to securities law open up the possibility of registering bearer securities in a shared electronic recording device (DEEP), such as blockchain , under the pilot regime.  

This registration can be done in two forms: as a registered financial security registered in DEEP resulting from Ordinance No. 2009-15 of January 8, 2009 (and in accordance with Ordinance No. 2017-1674 of December 8, 2017, known as blockchain), or as a bearer financial security registered in DEEP resulting from the DDADUE law under the conditions set by the pilot scheme.

The central bank said these experiments show "the operational feasibility and practical implementation of the three models it has conceptualised for issuing wCBDC directly on DLT: (1) the interoperability model, (2) the distribution model and (3) the integration model."

They all address "key aspects of wholesale CBDC implementation and each model offers different capabilities and functionalities compared to the conventional systems, so they can be complementary rather than exclusive."
 
This report highlights the following takeaways:

Key policy takeaways

1. Issuing a wholesale CBDC, as a complement to a retail CBDC, would contribute to the singleness of money by ensuring the anchoring value of central bank money for both retail and wholesale payments, and convertibility between the different forms of private money..

2. International cooperation and public-private partnerships remain a priority to converge towards a more globally inclusive and interoperable wholesale CBDC framework.

3. Interoperability should be prioritised to ensure seamless data and transaction exchange between DLT-based and conventional infrastructures.

4. Climate-related concerns highlight the need to develop energy-efficient solutions in the design of wholesale CBDCs.

Key technical takeaways

5. Technological advancements related to DLT offer various means for central banks to maintain control over their wholesale CBDC.

6. Central banks should remain technologically neutral while actively contributing to the adoption of common standards.

7. DLT could enhance the straight-through processing of trade and post-trade activities and contribute to overall financial stability.

8. Continued experiments at domestic and international level are essential to advance our analysis and our efforts to develop an operational framework through a learning-by-doing approach.