Retail CBDCs: State of Play

Inflation, perhaps because it has been “dormant” for so long, is generally not considered as a factor. As this is written, this may change since inflation around the globe has been rising due to the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic. What remains in doubt, however, but is outside the scope of this paper, is the extent to which the current surge in prices is temporary. If it is not temporary, this may have a profound impact on the deployment of CBDC, especially if the public believes that monetary policy must accommodate a looser fiscal policy. Moreover, payment of interest of any kind on narrow CBDC effectively implies that it is no longer a perfect substitute for notes. Will society accept this turn of events if there is resistance, or is it impractical to eliminate all circulating notes and coins? On the one hand, estimating this inconvenience (or net convenience) yield is difficult. It is well known, of course, that private financial institutions would not welcome this change and, with growing pressure to permit some form of open banking around the globe, the challenge for central banks would become that much greater. Indeed, the prospect of a broad CBDC, especially if the public has direct access to the central bank, is likely to be seen as a step too far that blurs commercial and central banking functions. On the other hand, competitive pressures from fintech firms may well raise the convenience yield of retail CBDC under a regime where central banks provide narrow CBDC only. However, this still does not address the overall governance-related issues discussed above. The role and overall authority of the central bank are not left untouched by the introduction of retail CBDC.

Retail CBDC: State of Play

The evidence and discussion that follows focuses on the experience of the G20. This reflects, in part, the group’s role and influence in the future direction of global collective action. In addition, of course, the G20 consists of economies that, when combined, represent more than 80 percent of the globe’s GDP and a similarly large share of trade in goods and services. Equally important is that G20 membership consists of countries whose level of financial development varies considerably. This implies that any issues, challenges and tensions surrounding the development, introduction and governance of CBDC are likely to be magnified. While central banks are unlikely to introduce CBDC at the same time, the combination of first-mover advantage, as well as the likelihood that the AEs will set out in advance the rules of the game, may well lead to a rush of retail CBDC being introduced. These tensions also perfectly capture the unavoidable conflict between the desire to collaborate, if not cooperate, across countries and the pressures to act individually as a means of establishing the primacy of sovereignty.

There is growing evidence over time, in the United States and elsewhere, of what has been called the “cash paradox” (Williams 2012; Ashworth and Goodhart 2020). This phenomenon refers to the continued strong demand for notes in circulation even as the intensity with which digital alternatives to cash (for example, debit and credit cards) have proliferated.7 That said, a consensus explanation for the paradox continues to elude researchers, in part, because it is likely that several phenomena, some purely economic in nature (for example, inflation), others more structural (for example, aging, wealth and income inequality), are likely simultaneously in play.8 As we shall see below, challenges around the introduction of CBDC cannot ignore the existing drivers of the demand for cash.

Naturally, in view of the questions most germane to this study, of equal interest are changes in payments that are of the cashless variety. Figure 1 clearly illustrates the growth in digital forms of payments as a percent of GDP (left side) for the 2012–2018 period for which we have data. Note that China is excluded for reasons that will soon become apparent. Two striking phenomena stand out from the data. First, the growing importance of cashless transactions varies considerably both in terms of the levels and rates of change over time. Levels of cashless transactions are relatively modest, to date, in countries such as India, Indonesia and Mexico, to give three examples. That said, the push toward digitalization outside

7 Cash, of course, also includes coins in circulation, which are included in some of the calculations discussed below. However, for simplicity, the author equates cash with notes, which represent the overwhelming proportion of currency in circulation outside banks. Many of these developments preceded the arrival of the COVID-19 pandemic.

8 The author (Siklos 2021) also notes the role of note denomination in generating this paradox, since the desire to hold cash reflects not only a transactions demand but also the store of value function of money. The cash paradox is not a universal phenomenon. Sweden, for example, has largely escaped this trend.

Figure 1: The Importance of Cashless Payments (G20, 2012–2018)

50% Cashless payments: Value of transactions as a percent of GDP

900% Cashless payments: Value of transactions as a percent of GDP: China

40%

Percent of GDP 30%

20%

10% 800%

Percent of GDP 700%

600%

500%

0%

Argentina - 2013Argentina - 2016Australia - 2012 Australia - 2015 Australia - 2018 Brazil - 2013Brazil - 2016Canada - 2012 Canada - 2015 Canada - 2018 France - 2013 France - 2016 Germany -2012Germany - 2015Germany - 2018India - 2014 India - 2017 Indonesia -2013 Indonesia - 2016 Italy - 2012Italy - 2015Italy - 2018Japan - 2014 Japan - 2017Korea - 2013 Korea - 2016 Mexico - 2012 Mexico -2015 Mexico - 2018 Russia - 2013 Russia - 2016 Saudi Arabia - 2012 Saudi Arabia - 2015Saudi Arabia - 2018South Africa - 2013 South Africa - 2016 Turkey - 2012 Turkey - 2017United Kingdom - 2013United Kingdom - 2016United States - 2012 United States - 2015 United States - 2018 400%

2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018

Source: Data is annual and from the BIS Red Book, a publication of the Committee on Payments and Market Infrastructures (see www.bis.org/statistics/payment_stats.htm). Notes: The bars are for the countries shown over the 2012–2018 period. For each country, a particular year is identified (for example, 2018 for the United States).

the AEs is likely to change rapidly.9 Similarly, in a few AEs (for example, Germany, Italy), the intensity of cashless payments lags behind other members of the same group such as Australia, Canada and the United Kingdom. Second, the usual divide between AEs and emerging market economies (EMEs) in discussions about economic performance and policy recommendations does not apply to explain the rising importance of digital payments. Indeed, to highlight this development, the bar chart on the right in Figure 1 shows that the value of cashless transactions as a percent of GDP in China far exceeds the value of those transactions elsewhere in the G20. China, like Russia and Turkey, to give two additional examples, also displays a preference for cashless payments that rivals that found in many AEs.

Cashless payments, of course, come in many forms. Since some of the debate over the impact from the potential introduction of CBDC is around strong substitutes for cash, namely, debit and credit cards, as well as e-money, Figure 2 displays the relative importance of these forms of digital payments, as a percent of all cashless

9 A good example is the Government of India’s involvement in encouraging digital payments domestically but with an eye to spreading the homegrown technology’s usage internationally. See Government of India,

Ministry of Information and Broadcasting (2021). payments, again for the G20. As before, China stands out from the other G20 members, although it is noteworthy that retail forms of payment continue to effectively represent a relatively small proportion of all cashless payments. Perhaps this explains, in part, the tremendous interest and potential for digital forms of retail payments, in future, to play a larger economic and financial role. It is also worth pointing out that growth rates in retail forms of cashless payments, although clearly visible, are nowhere as impressive as some of the growth rates exhibited in all forms of cashless payments (see Figure 1). Finally, there is again no apparent AE versus EME divide: there are examples from both groups where growth is either strong (for example, China, Russia and the United States) or modest over time (for example, Australia and the United Kingdom).

As noted earlier, developments in digital forms of payment cannot ignore what is happening to the demand for cash. Indeed, since most central banks have tended to emphasize a preference for thinking about CBDC as an alternative or a complement to cash instead of as a conventional financial asset that generates a return over time, a better understanding of what has been driving cash holdings, at the global level, may be instructive. This is also a useful exercise

Figure 2: Relative Importance of Selected Forms of Cashless Payments

24% Volume of cashless payments: Debit, credit cards and e-money

Percent of cashless payments

20%

16%

12%

8%

4%

0%

Arg en t ina 2015 Arg en t ina 2018 Aus tra l ia 2014 Aus tra l ia 2017 Braz i l 2013 Braz i l 2016 Cana da 2013 Cana da 2018 Ch ina 2014 Ch ina 2017 France 2013 France 2016 Germany 2013 Germany 2018 I nd ia 2014 I nd ia 2017 In dones ia 2013 In dones ia 2016 I ta ly 2013 I ta ly 2018 Jap an 2014 Jap an 2017 Korea 2013 Korea 2016 Mex ico 2013 Mex ico 2018 Russ ia 2014 Russ ia 2017 Sau d i Ara b ia 2013 Sau d i Ara b ia 2016 Sou t h Afr ica 2013 Sou t h Afr ica 2018 Tur key 2014 Tur key 2017 Un ite d K in gdo m 2013 Un ite d K in gdo m 2016 Un ite d S ta tes 2013 Un ite d S ta tes 2018

Source: BIS Red Book (www.bis.org/statistics/payment_stats.htm). Note: See note to Figure 1.

when dealing with the challenges central banks face when putting CBDC in circulation.

Decades ago, a popular exercise was to estimate models of the demand for money (for example, see Laidler 1993). While there continues to be interest in the topic, empirical research in the area has diminished considerably over time.10 Yet the prospect of a CBDC must prompt policy makers to ask whether we have a good understanding of the determinants of cash demand as well as the motives for holding notes in circulation. Moreover, depending on the type of CBDC introduced, and the overall economic

10 At least two reasons explain this development. First, it proved difficult to find a definition of the money supply that could yield a stable relationship between money demand and its determinants, although this has not prevented the search for stable functions (for example, see Lucas and

Nicolini 2015). Second, since at least the early 1990s, interest in the behaviour of monetary aggregates was replaced by a focus on central bank policy rates to evaluate the stance of monetary policy. Interestingly, some of the more recent research is beginning to employ micro-level data (for example, at the bank level) to investigate what drives cash demand and how government interventions (for example, changes in tax and other financial regulations) impact how much cash is held and in what denominations. For example, see Attanasio et al. (2002), Benchimol and

Qureshi (2019), and references therein. environment in which it is introduced, the role of cash as a transactions medium versus its potential as a store of value has become relevant again.11 Crucially, CBDCs have the potential to greatly disrupt international payments systems because digital forms of payments promise to threaten the sovereignty of monetary policy, especially where economic performance and governance are weak. However, as Raphael Auer et al. (2021) point out, the potential for CBDC to be globally disruptive is not only unresolved but also research about its consequences remains in its infancy.

To provide some insights into what factors drive the demand for cash, Table 1 provides some estimates of the role of key economic and institutional factors in the G20 economies. The empirical estimates are divided into two related sections necessitated, in part, by how economics treats the issue of what determines the demand for cash. Whether cash is held for transactions, purchases or as a financial asset, holders will also

11 Traditionally, money is thought to fulfill three functions: a unit of account, a medium of exchange and a store of value.

Table 1: Governance, Capacity and Cashless Payments (2012–2018)

Variable Dependent variable: Cashlesspp/100 Coefficient Std. error T-statistic Prob.

C

Econfree

Legal

Finopen

Contracts -4.04

-0.53

0.86

0.50

0.20 2.20

0.50

0.46

0.11

0.20 -1.84

-1.05

1.84

4.44

1.03 0.07

0.30

0.07

0.00

0.30

AE -4.37 0.99 -4.43 0.00

User 0.04 0.01

Period fixed effects? Yes 3.28 0.00

R-squared 0.64 No. of crosssections 17

Adjusted R-squared

F-statistic 0.60 No. of observations 112

14.88

Prob. (F-statistic) 0.00

Sources: Data for cash, cashless and cashlesspp is from the BIS Red Book (see www.bis.org/statistics/payment_ stats.htm). The governance indicators are from the Fraser Institute’s Economic Freedom of the World annual reports (see www.fraserinstitute.org/studies/economic-freedom). Data is from the World Bank’s World Development Indicators (see https://datatopics.worldbank.org/world-development-indicators/). Data is annual. Estimation is via panel least squares. Notes: Cashlesspp is the total volume of cashless payments per 100 inhabitants. Seventeen countries represent the 19 members of the G20 (euro-area data consists of the mean of data for France, Germany and Italy). C = currency in circulation; econfree = economic freedom summary index; legal = legal system and property rights; finopen = financial openness; contracts = legal enforcement of contracts. AE is a dummy variable identifying advanced G20 economies (Australia, Canada, European Union, Japan, Korea, the United Kingdom and the United States). “User” is the percent of the population using the internet.

consider the purchasing power of cash. As a result, the demand for cash is generally expressed in real terms, that is, nominal cash holdings deflated by the price level.12 The author uses annual data for a sample, where data is available, from 1980 to 2020.13

Traditionally, transactions demand is driven by real income, that is, nominal income deflated by the price level, while the store of value function is influenced by the opportunity cost of holding cash. The latter is very difficult to translate into practice for several reasons. First, while bank deposits are an obvious alternative, there are severe limitations in

12 Just as currency in circulation has risen over time, real cash holdings have also risen over time in every G20 country. See the appendix.

13 The appendix provides more details about data availability for each country in the data set. For some of the variables, only annual data is available and data availability becomes an even greater constraint if one tried to start the sample before 1980. obtaining data that is comparable across countries. Moreover, deposit rates usually change infrequently and are often influenced by the regulatory environment in which banks operate. Often then, a symbolic interest rate is used such as yield on a risk-free rate.14 This is the strategy adopted below.

But there are other forces at play that are also relevant for the debate about the form in which CBDCs are introduced. Beyond the usual risk of loss, cash offers the convenience of purchasing goods and services when the opportunity

14 A yield on a short-term government instrument is a good example.

However, comparability across the G20 countries can also be problematic, not to mention data availability for a sufficiently long sample. Where available, the author used a deposit interest rate.

Elsewhere, a comparable rate is the interest rate on the policy instrument used by a central bank. Where data limitations exist, a short-term government bond, such as a three-month Treasury bill, did not impact the conclusions.

to settle transactions digitally is unavailable (for example, the merchant does not have the required equipment, or there are climate-related interruptions in network access). Moreover, cash transactions are private whereas digital ones need not be and, depending on the rule of law, provide an opportunity for governments to access information for tax collection purposes. Indeed, legal restrictions often exist on transaction amounts deemed to legally settle payments.15 While all of these factors suggest that holding cash offers a kind of convenience yield that provides an incentive to hold a non-interest earning asset, a CBDC may also generate some inconveniences (loss of privacy and anonymity, loss through hacking) that may require compensation (insurance against loss, greater security, facilitating cross-border transactions). Hence, central banks are wise to argue that digital and physical forms of cash will both continue to be in demand and, hence, are likely to co-exist. This still leaves the option for central banks to create at least two classes of currency, thereby providing the central bank with an opportunity to create a new instrument of monetary policy since digital cash holdings can earn interest or incur a penalty. The author returns to this issue in the next section.

Monetary theory (for example, see Laidler 1993) postulates that an equilibrium relationship exists between the three variables. In other words, real balances, income and an interest rate are linked to each other such that when income rises or interest rates fall, individuals will want to hold more cash and vice versa when these variables change in the opposite direction. In theory, changes in income and interest rates will also influence the demand for cash to maintain the equilibrium relationship.16 We can express the equilibrium, or “long-run” relationship, using arrows to express the sign of the relationship between the drivers of real cash balances and their determinants as follows:

Core equilibrium real cash holdings determinants: income ↑; interest rate ↓

15 This point is underscored by two lawyers in the US Federal Reserve

System (Cheng and Torregrossa 2021) who explain that once one goes beyond Federal Reserve notes, legal rights become murky but are definitely no longer secured against the “full faith and credit” of the sovereign (the US government in this case).

16 In other terms, we expect these variables to be cointegrated, which is the statistical equivalent of the equilibrium condition described. In the short term, deviations from equilibrium are expected to be stationary, that is, a series without trend and a constant variance. If economic theory has a well-established narrative, together with supportive empirical evidence, about what drives the demand for cash in the long run, there is much less agreement on its shortrun determinants. Historically, the threat to cash holdings has often been how useful these are for transactions purposes as well as the degree to which cash holdings are protected against loss of purchasing power. The latter, of course, is a threat to the store of value function of money. Inflation is often used as an indicator of the attractiveness of holding cash. Nevertheless, inflation control is ultimately also ensured by institutional arrangements created to prevent excessive inflation. This usually includes a monetary policy regime that is expected to control inflation together with a fiscal authority that supports this goal.17 Since the demand for cash will be determined by how much confidence society has in its current and future value, the results discussed below resort to two proxies for the institutional setting in which cash circulates in the countries considered.18 They are the size, in relation to a country’s GDP, of defaults in government or sovereign debt and what has been called “contract intensity.” The latter is an oft-used indicator of the enforceability of contracts and the security of property rights that was proposed by Christopher Clague et al. (1999). Contract intensity is defined as the fraction of a country’s money supply held as bank deposits.19 Clearly, other drivers of cash holdings are conceivable, including ones that are more directly related to technological developments over the past

17 Since the early 1990s, inflation control has been a deliberate policy, supported by giving the monetary authority autonomy from political influence, and is often underscored by a commitment to low and stable inflation often, but not always, via a policy of inflation targeting.

Among the G20, 14 of 17 economies have an explicit form of inflation control since the early 1990s or 2000s. In 10 of 17 economies, inflation targeting defines the monetary regime in place by the end of the sample (2018–2020). See, for example, Siklos (2017).

18 Inflation was also considered. The results (not shown) suggest that it often takes the place of the chosen interest rate variable. This is perhaps not all that surprising since, in theory though not always in practice, nominal interest rates ought to reflect inflation (more precisely, expected inflation). 19 More precisely, (M2-C)/M2 where M2 is the money supply and C is notes and coins in circulation. There are a large number of money supply definitions. For example, the Bank of Canada publishes three measures depending on the type of deposit or financial asset (for example, mutual funds: see www.bankofcanada.ca/rates/indicators/key-variables/ monetary-aggregates/) included. Issues of data comparability are also relevant when defining the money supply in a cross-country setting.

Clague et al. (1999) use the M2 definition, which includes notes and coins in circulation together with demand and some savings deposits, and the source (i.e., the World Bank’s World Development Indicators) attempts to ensure cross-country comparability. In the results reported later in this paper, M2 is also used.

two decades in particular. However, due to data limitations,20 these are omitted, although other estimations (not shown) support the general conclusions discussed below.21

The top portion of Table 2 shows first estimates of the equilibrium, or long-run relationship, between income and the interest rate.22 Results for the G20 economies23 suggest that, statistically speaking, demand for cash rises one for one with a percent increase in real income. Moreover, a rise in interest rates reduces cash holdings and, keeping in mind that the logarithms of interest rates are used, the impact is such that a 100-basis-point rise in interest rates across the G20 results approximately in a six percent fall in demand for cash. These results establish that there exists an equilibrium relationship between real cash balances, income and the interest rate that theory predicts. Will this result persist in a world where narrow CBDCs circulate alongside traditional notes and coins? There is every reason to believe so. Indeed, the potential for the monetary authority to pay interest or charge a penalty for holding digital forms of cash may raise the interest sensitivity of the demand for cash. Of course, central banks as conservative institutions may decline, at first, to resort to exploiting the opportunity to use narrow CBDC as a policy instrument and tout other benefits of digital money instead. What if a broad CBDC is introduced? Interest sensitivity could be comparable to the narrow CBDC case, especially if the costs of switching from digital cash to bank accounts are effectively reduced. One complication is whether the public would be allowed to hold deposits at the central bank. In principle, deposits at a central bank can be viewed as just notes and coins in circulation in a different form. However, as noted earlier, the

20 For example, data such as that which is reported in Figures 1 and 2 is only available since 2012. Similarly, data on the number of automated teller machines or connectivity to the internet is also available (for example, from the World Bank’s World Development Indicators) but only for a sample that begins well after the first decade of the 2000s and is spotty for some G20 countries.

21 The usual strategy is followed to deal with at least some omitted variables. In particular, period fixed effects are added since some of the difficult-to-quantify factors will impact cash demand over time. The results discussed below also include a dummy variable that identifies the EMEs in the data set. Using fixed effects instead yielded almost identical results. 22 In keeping with fairly standard practice (for example, see Chen and

Siklos 2021), both real income, proxied by real GDP, and the interest rate variable enter in log form (namely, more precisely, as log [100 + interest rate], where interest rate is in percent per annum).

23 Unless otherwise stated, the G20 consists here of 17 economies as euroarea data is used instead of separate data for France, Germany and

Italy. risk of disintermediation would impact deposits held in the banking system. This suggests another reason for the “contract” between the central bank and the government to be re-examined.

If the long-run properties of money demand persist, then we may also expect its short-run properties to provide continued insights into the prospective demand for narrow CBDC.24 The bottom portion of Table 2 goes on to provide estimates of the short-run drivers of the demand for cash. Income continues to positively impact cash demand, but the response is considerably lower in the shortrun than in equilibrium. In contrast, cash demand reacts relatively more strongly to an interest rate increase in the short run. Turning to the institutional determinants, a rise in defaults on sovereign debt increases cash holding, although the impact is economically negligible. In contrast, a decline in contract intensity, which implies a deterioration in contract enforceability and in the protection of property rights, translates into a rise in real balance holdings. Given how contract intensity is defined, this means that deposits in the banking system fall, which is an indication of a loss of faith in the financial system. The coefficient is economically large and strongly suggests that the institutional environment matters. There is also no difference according to whether the economy in the sample is an emerging market or not. Finally, the significance of the error correction term, that is, the residuals from the estimates of the equilibrium relationship between cash balances, income and the interest rate, represents a further confirmation of the existence of a long-run relationship between these variables. Therefore, changes in income and the interest rate generate compensating effects on cash balance holdings such that an equilibrium relationship is maintained.

Now, at least two objections can be levelled at the results so far.25 First, if some societies, for a variety of economic and institutional reasons, hold larger amounts of cash on average over time, their short-run cash demand might respond quite differently to the drivers used in Table 1. Second, despite the addition of period fixed effects,26 the

24 The same complications noted previously remain for the broad form of

CBDC.

25 A third objection could be that the right-hand side variables are endogenous. Lagging these variables did not change the results much and taking into account endogeneity more formally.

26 This is done, in part, to account for factors that are not directly observed, or for which we have no data.

Table 2: Explaining the Demand for Cash in the G20 (1980–2020)

The Long Run

Variable

Real GDP

Interest rate

Observations

Demand for cash: Real currency balances

Coeff. estimate (std. err.) [p-value]

1.03 (0.02) [0.00]

-0.06 (0.03) [0.07]

527

Cross-sections 17

Notes: Real currency balances are nominal currency (and coins where relevant) outside banks divided by the Consumer Price Index. Real currency balances and real GDP are in logarithms while the interest rate is log (100 + interest rate). Estimation is by weighted fully modified panel least squares with a constant and a deterministic trend (results not shown). A Parzel kernel and Newey-West fixed bandwidth are used to estimate the cointegrating regression covariances. Std. err. is the standard error of coefficient estimates; p-value is the statistical significance level of coefficient estimates.

The Short Run

Variable

Demand for cash: Rate of change in real currency balances Full sample Full sample right tail Full sample left tail 1980–2007 2008–2020

Coeff. estimate (std. err.) [p-value] Coeff. estimate (std. err.) [p-value] Coeff. estimate (std. err.) [p-value] Coeff. estimate (std. err.) [p-value] Coeff. estimate (std. err.) [p-value]

Constant

0.96 (0.19) [0.00] 0.85 (0.22) [0.00] 1.49 (0.20) [0.00] 1.12 (0.18) [0.00] 0.14 (0.70) [0.84] Real GDP growth 0.67 (0.12) [0.00] 0.74 (0.14) [0.00] 0.72 (0.16) [0.00] 0.77 (0.13) [0.00] 1.46 (0.21) [0.03] Interest rate -0.14 (0.04) [0.00] -0.12 (0.04) [0.01] -0.27 (0.05) [0.00] -0.18 (0.04) [0.00] 0.06 (0.15) [0.69] Size of sovereign debt default 0.001 (0.0004) [0.07] 0.001 (0.0001) [0.00] 0.001 (0.0001) [0.00] 0.001 (0.0004) [0.01] -1.28 (1.32) [0.33] Contract intensity -0.31 (0.06) [0.00] -0.30 (0.09) [0.00] -0.24 (0.09) [0.01] -0.28 (0.08) [0.12] -0.41 (0.13) [0.00]

EMEs 0.006 (0.009) [0.53] 0.02 (0.01) [0.03] 0.01 (0.01) [0.56] 0.02 (0.01) [0.12] -0.01 (0.02) [0.48]

Error correction (-1) Period fixed effects -0.25 (0.03) [0.00] -0.25 (0.04) [0.00] -0.22 -0.25 (0.03) [0.00] -0.32 (0.05) [0.00]

Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes

Observations 476 297 297 297 179

Cross-sections 17 17 17 17 16

Adjusted R2 F-stat.

0.31 5.83 [0.00] 0.21 n/a 0.25 n/a 0.36

0.17 28.43 [0.00] 7.25 [0.00]

Notes: See long-run table for estimation method and coefficient estimate information. Size of sovereign debt default is sovereign debt defaulted as a percent of GDP. Contract intensity is (M2-C)/M2 where M2 is a broad monetary aggregate measure and C is currency in circulation. EME is a dummy variable taking on the value of one for the EMEs in the sample. The number of crosssections and observations is shown in the long-run table. Period fixed effects are not shown, and test indicating that they are not redundant is shown above with degrees of freedom in parentheses and p-value in square brackets. Error correction is the residuals from the long-run table regression lagged one period. The right tail refers to the 75 percent and above quantile of real cash balances held; the left tail is the 0–25 percent quantile of real cash balance holders in the G20 economies considered.

GFC represents a large financial shock that may also have altered how cash demand responds to the variables assumed to affect it. Accordingly, the remaining columns in the bottom portion of Table 1 consider how the demand for cash at the high and low ends of the cash-holding spectrum are affected by its determinants. The final two columns examine the case where the sample is broken down into pre- and post-GFC periods (i.e., 1980–2007 and 2008–2020). The results suggest that income’s impact on cash demand is not terribly sensitive to which portion of the distribution of cash holdings one considers, or if the pre-GFC period is considered in isolation. However, cash demand rises considerably less (the difference is statistically significant; test result not shown) in the post-GFC era relative to all the other cases considered. There is considerably more sensitivity in the short-run relationship between interest rates and cash demand. Those countries where cash holdings are higher than average are significantly less sensitive to an interest rate change than where cash holdings are relatively smaller in the spectrum considered. Moreover, while interest sensitivity is comparable at the higher end of the cash-holding distribution when looking at the full sample estimates (first column) and the pre-GFC era, interest sensitivity disappears, statistically speaking, post-GFC. The last result is not entirely surprising as this is also the era of ultra-low interest rates that began in AEs and spread throughout the world. Most of the other results remain largely unchanged, but it is noteworthy that contract intensity is considerably higher in the post-GFC era and almost as large as the impact of income on the demand for cash. At the risk of some oversimplification, the post-GFC era may have raised, at least across the G20 as a group, the relative importance of the institutional environment in dictating the demand for cash. Policy makers may wish to take this into account when thinking about how to introduce CBDC and the form it will take.27

The foregoing results clearly suggest a link between the demand for cash and the trust that societies place in the monetary authorities and, by implication, governments. After all, it bears repeating that, despite central bank independence, monetary authorities derive their power from government since they are an institution within,

27 Depending on the regulations and transactions costs, this result will also have implications for the public’s ability to substitute digital currencies.

This is an issue beyond the scope of this paper. and not apart from, the political authorities. Hence, even if the public has confidence in the central bank, trust in government and governance considerations also loom large. This is especially true in the case of CBDC as we shall see in greater detail. However, for the time being, it is worth further underscoring the importance of the trust and governance by asking what the state of play is in the G20 around these two factors. Accordingly, Figure 3 considers how levels of overall trust in governments have changed since 2011 as measured by an annual survey since 2006 conducted by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD).28 Since not all G20 members are surveyed by the OECD, additional data from the World Bank (see Figure 4) is used to construct a proxy for trust. Consequently, some of the data must be treated with caution.29

Positive values for the bar chart indicate that a rising proportion of the population surveyed trusted governments over the 2011–2020 period. Crucially, the sample includes the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic but excludes the fallout from the GFC of 2008–2009.30 Figure 3 reveals that levels of trust have risen in most countries surveyed, despite an eventful period both economically and politically. That said, there is considerable heterogeneity in performance across the G20. Equally important improvements in trust are not exclusively restricted to AEs or EMEs. Of course, changes in trust, while necessary, are not sufficient. It is also important for levels of trust to be high, especially when a change in the order of magnitude as CBDC rests on trust. That said, levels of trust are just as heterogeneous in 2011 and again in 2020 as suggested in Figure 3.31

Unfortunately, surveys such as the one reported in Figure 3 are not informative about the sources of trust, that is, the degree to which governance and accountability play a role. Figure 4 then offers a

28 The OECD views integrity, fairness and openness of institutions as being reflected in the trust citizens display toward government. See www.oecd.org/gov/trust-in-government.htm for details.

29 The proxy is used for Argentina, China, India, Indonesia, South Africa and the euro area. There was no data for Saudi Arabia for 2011.

30 That is, if we assume that the impact of the GFC on trust in government dissipated by 2011.

31 For example, in 2011, levels of trust (i.e., percent of respondents that expressed trust in government) ranged from a low of 23 percent (Japan) to a high of 74 percent (Indonesia); in 2020, respondents in Brazil expressed the least amount of trust (36 percent), with Indonesia again ranked highest (92 percent).

Figure 3: Change in Trust in Government (2020 versus 2011)

25%

Trust in 2020 less trust in 2011: Change in trust 20%

15%

10%

5%

0%

-5%

-10% EME

-15%

Argentina Australia Brazil Canada China France Germany India Indonesia Italy Japan Korea Mexico Russia Saudi Arabia South Africa Turkey United Kingdom United States Euro area

Source: Data is from the OECD Trust in Government survey in which respondents were asked whether they trust their governments (see www.oecd.org/gov/trust-in-government.htm for data and definitions). Notes: Levels of trust in 2020 less levels in 2011. A positive number means a rise in trust in government (i.e., levels higher in 2020 than in 2011); negative values imply a loss of trust in government. In the case of Argentina, China, India, Indonesia, South Africa and the euro area, an index was constructed from the indicator described in Figure 4. The sum of the individual characteristics was converted to a value ranging from 0 to 100, and the change between 2020 and 2011 is seen as a proxy for the change in trust in government.

snapshot of levels of governance and accountability as defined by characteristics identified within the financial sector. This strategy is adopted since acceptance and success of retail CBDC will be influenced by the confidence the public has in supervision, oversight and consumer protection in dealings with the financial sector. The good news is that institutional improvements are apparent in 12 of the G20 economies. Moreover, several countries are close to the maximum attainable score. The bad news is that a deterioration is seen in three of the arguably four systematically important economies, that is, the United Kingdom, the United States and the euro area. In the case of the United Kingdom, the source of the deterioration is due to a change in the number of agencies responsible for prudential supervision of banks; in the United States and the euro area, it is due to changes in the body responsible for macroprudential supervision. As a result, the appeal of narrow CBDCs issued by the world’s two most important central banks may be negatively affected, although it is unclear whether the public is attentive enough to these developments.

An obvious criticism of the data shown in Figure 4 is that it is too narrowly focused on the financial sector and, especially, selected oversight and prudential elements. Therefore, Table 1 asks whether the volume of cashless payments over the 2012–2018 period (see also Figure 1) for which data is available, is driven, in part, by governance considerations more generally. Governance indicators from the Fraser Institute are used with controls for the group of economies in question and the fraction of the populations using the internet.32 It is notable that the legal environment (Legal) and financial openness (Finopen) are highly significant and contribute to raising the

32 Since the sample is small, there are limitations on the number of controls one can include and, in addition, period fixed effects are added to absorb other controls that might be omitted.