BoB targeting 10 lakh CBDC users over next 3-4 months

Joydeep Dutta Roy

Bank of Baroda is looking to increase the Central Bank Digital Currency (CBDC) users to 10 lakh over the next three to four months, the state-owned lender’s executive director Joydeep Dutta Roy said on November 23.

At present, the bank has around 2.5 lakh CBDC users.

“We have around 2.5 lakh users and we are working to make 10 lakh users over next 3-4 months,” Roy said on the sidelines of an event organised by the industry body FICCI and the Indian Banks Association.

The Reserve Bank of India had in December 2022 started the retail pilot of its digital currency.

Also read: SBI clocks over 9 lakh CBDC transactions since December 2022, says official

In September this year, RBI deputy governor T Rabi Sankar said that around 15,000 transactions were taking place a day in the pilot testing.

“It is roughly around 15,000 transactions a day or so; we will have to take it to one million,” Sankar said.

The RBI had completed the interoperability with the Unified Payments Interface (UPI) QR codes, and now the focus would be on transactions, he added.

With interoperability, customers can send funds from a CBDC wallet or directly from a bank account using a single QR code.

Also read: Exclusive: Union Budget likely to focus on ease of doing business

Soon after, most banks, including SBI, Yes Bank, and PNB, announced the interoperability.

Commenting on the transactions, Roy said the lender was not working on the number of transactions but focusing more on the users. “The moment user base will becomes 10 lakh, the number of transactions will go up,” Roy said.