DC/EP TIMELINE

Before 2012

Third-party payment platforms, especially those using digital and network technologies, develop, but there is a lack of management and coordination body. Some discussions require the People's Bank of China, the central bank, to manage these platforms, so the PBOC starts to issue business licenses to third-party payment companies. The first license is issued to Alipay, a mobile payment app belonging to Alibaba Group.

2014

The PBOC sets up a digital currency project team. But the project's implementation plan has no clear direction in areas like blockchain technology and other possibilities.

2016

The PBOC establishes a Digital Currency Research Institute, which has an organizational structure similar to the institute for bank notes' issuance and research. It also indicates that the design work of the bank notes of the next generation has stopped.

2017

The PBOC starts to research and develop digital RMB, or e-CNY, also known as digital currency and electronic payment, or DC/EP. The central bank also clarifies it will separate DC/EP from digitalized asset transactions. In the same year, the PBOC bans trading in Initial Coin Offerings or ICOs and cryptocurrency Bitcoin in China.

2019

The PBOC starts the pilot programs and closes tests of DC/EP.

2020

Internal and closed-circuit tests of DC/EP start pilots in cities of Shenzhen, Suzhou and Chengdu, as well as in the Xiong'an New Area in Hebei province. Some tests are also conducted for the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics.

China Daily