Central African Regional Bank Seeks Common Digital Currency

Baudelaire Mieu and Katarina Hoije, Bloomberg News

The offices of the Caisse Nationale des Prevoyances Sociales, left, the Central Bank of Central African States, center, and the Arch of the Place de la Nation sit on the city skyline in N'Djamena, Chad, on Wednesday, Aug. 16, 2017. African Development Bank and nations signed agreement to finance a project linking the town of Ngouandere in Cameroon and Chad’s capital, N’Djamena, according to statement handed to reporters in Cameroonian capital, Yaounde in July. Photographer: Xaume Olleros/Bloomberg , Bloomberg

(Bloomberg) -- The central African regional bank has been urged by its board to introduce a common digital currency for its six member states to modernize payment structures and promote regional financial inclusion.

The board made the call in an emailed statement signed by its head, Herve Ndoba, following a meeting in Cameroon’s economic capital, Douala, this week.

Several sub-Saharan African central banks are exploring, or are in the pilot phase of issuing digital currencies, following Nigeria’s October launch of the e-naira. The Bank of Central African States, which serves Cameroon, Gabon, Chad, the Republic of Congo, Equatorial Guinea and the Central African Republic, will become the first regional bank to introduce a virtual currency.

The proposal comes after the central bank’s strong opposition for the Central African Republic’s adoption of Bitcoin as legal tender this year.

The law adopting Bitcoin as legal tender in CAR is “incompatible with the agreements and conventions governing the Central African Monetary Union and the Statutes of the Bank of Central African States,” the regional monetary union said in a separate statement late Thursday.

The central bank should also develop a common framework regulating cryptocurrencies, it said.