Crypto Community Rejects IMF’s Plans for Central Bank Digital Currency: “No One Wants This”

IMF’s Endeavor to Promote Central Bank Digital Currencies

As the International Monetary Fund (IMF) persists in its endeavor to promote the technologies that underlie central bank digital currencies (CBDCs), some participants in the crypto community have voiced strong opposition to the IMF’s attempts to further the initiative.

At a CBDC policy roundtable on June 19, Tobias Adrian, the Director of the Monetary and Capital Markets Department at the IMF, presented a new system for cross-border payments. This platform concept includes a blueprint for a payment system that utilizes a single ledger to record CBDC transactions. Adrian stated that the “XC platform” will have a ledger in which digital representations of central bank reserves in any currency can be exchanged.

Reactions from the Crypto Community

Despite the enthusiasm of the IMF to promote new progress, not everyone in the crypto world was as receptive: Many saw the move as a “power grab” and argued that no one desires a form of money that is centrally regulated.

According to a Reddit user, the entire endeavor is a ploy by the IMF to increase their power, claiming that the organization is now exploiting issues that have been “neglected for decades” such as financial inclusion as a “Trojan horse” to promote CBDCs. The Reddit user wrote:

On Twitter, one individual expressed disapproval of the IMF’s latest action by claiming that the new platform was similar to a “sh*tcoin.” The Twitter user argued that governments or the IMF should not be allowed to decide which is the most suitable form of money.

Despite a warning from the International Monetary Fund, Zimbabwe has sold millions of crypto tokens backed by gold.

In reaction to the new platform, another community member referred to CBDCs as a “dystopian nightmare”. The Redditor pointed out that this would give governmental agencies total power over people since they would be able to keep track of every single transaction and give the IMF the capacity to switch off access to their own money whenever they desire.

One person expressed relief that there have not been any proponents of Central Bank Digital Currencies, noting that “no one wants this” kind of centrally-managed and controlled money.

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