Jeremy Marks writes for Atlantic Council: As China accelerates its efforts to widely distribute its digital currency before the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics, Chinese officials are reassuring the public that the initiative is simply about strengthening the monetary system. The furthest thing from their minds, the government insists, is undercutting the role of China’s “tech giants” in the mobile economy. In fact, once the digital yuan is in wide circulation, it will likely strike the digital-payments operations of China’s largest e-commerce and fintech conglomerates—Alibaba Group Holding and Tencent Holdings. That will advance two of Chinese President Xi Jinping’s key goals: to rein in the power of China’s private sector and to create a mechanism through which the government can access reams of digital data that may prove helpful to Beijing in the global race to develop artificial intelligence (AI).
go to Atlantic Council website: Why China’s digital currency threatens the country’s tech giants – Atlantic Council
