Status : Pilot
Usecase : Wholesale
Project Aber was initiated by the central banks of Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates to investigate the potential of a central bank digital currency (CBDC) for domestic and cross-border settlements. The project focused on the use of real money and emphasized security. It utilized the Saudi Riyal (SAR) and the Emirati Dirham (AED), both of which are pegged to the US dollar. Three use cases were explored, starting with cross-border settlement between the central banks and progressing to settlement between commercial banks within the same country and ultimately between commercial banks in both countries. The tests demonstrated that the decentralized infrastructure enhanced resilience and privacy. In September 2022, Mohsen Al Zahrani was appointed to lead Saudi Arabia’s CBDC project, and in January 2023, the Saudi Central Bank announced increased research into CBDCs, focusing on domestic wholesale CBDC use cases with local commercial banks and fintech partners. The motivations behind Project Aber included researching distributed ledger technology (DLT), exploring its potential in overcoming inefficiencies in cross-border payments, benchmarking performance against other use cases, and gaining knowledge and experience in deploying a mutualized infrastructure.
Sources: Saudi Central Bank, Atlantic Council Research, coindesk.com
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