Central Bank Digital Currency: Turkey's Central Bank Conducts First Transactions of Digital Lira – Will Other Countries Follow Suit?

cryptonews.com:

The Central Bank of the Republic of Turkey (CBRT) has completed the first trial of its central bank digital currency (CBDC), the Digital Turkish Lira. 

The country's central bank issued a press release on December 29, stating that,

"In the scope of the first-phase studies of the Digital Turkish Lira Project, conducted under the leadership of the [CBRT], the first payment transactions on the Digital Turkish Lira Network were executed successfully." 

Turkey is far from the only country looking to launch its CBDC - with increasingly more countries exploring ways to enter the digital fiat arena. China seems to be leading the way, and it just recently added cities to the nation’s digital yuan pilot. Also, Hong Kong and Mainland China are set to co-launch the digital yuan’s first cross-border pilot project.

The National Bank of Ukraine (NBU) introduced a draft concept for its CBDC, digital hryvnia, or e-hryvnia, at the end of November, and at that time India's central bank said it would undertake the first pilot for retail digital currency on December 1, with four local banks and four major cities participating in the pilot. Furthermore, the Japanese central bank could begin piloting the digital yen as early as spring 2023 and will reportedly start a trial involving “consumers and private sector companies.” 

All this said, it is likely we'll see more countries stepping into the CBDC space. 

The press release suggested that there are many further developments awaiting the CBDC project in the year to come.  

Primarily, the testing of the digital currency will continue throughout 2023. Specifically, the bank will continue to run limited, closed-circuit pilot tests with technology stakeholders in the first quarter of 2023. It will then