Adopting CBDC could destabilize banks, help households, US Treasury study says

cointelegraph.com:

Fully integrating a stablecoin or central bank digital currency (CBDC) into the economy would destabilize banks but improve household welfare, a study released by a United States Treasury division has claimed. The harm to banking caused by the digital currencies could be “significant” in times of stress, it found.

The Office of Financial Research study considered a theoretical “stable state” in the financial sector, after stablecoin or CBDC had been successfully introduced. This contrasts with studies that looked at the risks of bank runs and disintermediation caused by the introduction of the digital currencies.

The authors of the present study saw a risk of systemic deleveraging, that is, a reduction in banks’ equity, leading to reduced stability in times of crisis after the introduction of a digital currency.

Fully integrating a digital currency may improve household welfare, but banking sector stability could suffer.The @ofrgov explains why in a new blog post here https://t.co/xMzbjadrZR. For a deeper dive, click https://t.co/4fIpSOCYfm

With a stablecoin or CBDC in place in the economy, they argued, bank deposits would “compete” with the digital currency within households’ liquidity portfolios. That would cause banks to reduce the spread between lending and deposit rates by raising interest paid on deposits, leaving them with less equity than they would have without digital currencies present.

Related: US exploring ways to guarantee the country’s 18T of bank deposits: Report

Households would benefit from the competition between banks and digital currency. The authors wrote:

If digital currency competed too well with bank deposits, the resulting financial instability could have a negative effect on households,