Two in five CBDCs designed to be programmable
Over half of respondents’ retail CBDC projects are at research phase
Fewer than half of retail central bank digital currencies (CBDCs) are designed to be programmable, data from the Fintech Benchmarks 2026 shows.
Overall, twenty-three (69.7%) of 33 central banks indicated they were engaging in retail CBDC works. The figure is somewhat smaller than the 75% reported for a varied sample analysed in the 2025 benchmark.
Of the 23 respondents with rCBDC work ongoing, 19 responded to a question on programmability features. Eight (42.1%) of these say their rCBDCs have or
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