FIS Launches Tools For Central Bank To Create Digital Currencies (CBDC)

FIS has launched a new central infrastructure payment solution, RealNet Central, to help central banks transform their markets to digital-first, real-time payment economies. The company has also launched a virtual lab to allow central banks and commercial banks to experiment with digital currencies, said Julia Demidova, head of strategy for real-time payments and central bank digital currencies at FIS.

“We’ve seen an interest in payments and how to upgrade national mission critical infrastructure and to keep up with trends like real-time payments, digital assets and central bank digital currencies,” she said. “We can cover the whole payments value chain and help nations transform to a digital-first real-time economy.”

Real-time payment systems are coming, or already implemented, in countries around the world. According to the 2022 Worldpay from FIS Global Payments Report, 72% percent of the world’s population has, or will soon have, access to instant payments. FIS in its announcement said RealNet Central can accelerate real-time payments adoption by connecting a country’s businesses, consumers and financial institutions to real-time networks domestically and internationally.

FIS has partnered with M10 Networks to create the FIS CBDC Virtual Lab to help countries integrate CBDCs into their economies.

“The CBDC Virtual Lab allows central banks, commercial banks and other financial participants experiment with – and pilot – core concepts of issuance, transfer, redemption, offline payments, programmable payments, retail, wholesale and cross-border payments,” the company said in its announcement. “FIS’s CBDC Virtual Lab is enterprise-grade technology that supports over one million transactions per second at less than a second latency.”

Demidova said the Bank for International Settlements has been very involved in discussions of CBDC and has issued several consultation papers. Leadership from the BIS is improving the collaboration among central banks, she added.

“We need engagement and international cooperation in standardization and interoperability.”

Five countries have deployed Real Net Central, she added, and FIS is implementing it in a sixth country which will go live later this year.