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(Kitco News) - The digital yuan continues to make inroads into becoming widely utilized in Chinese society as the China Securities Regulatory Commission (CSRC) has officially approved the use of the central bank digital currency (CBDC) in the securities market.
According to a report from the Chinese media outlet Securities Times, eligible investors can now use the digital yuan to “buy off-site financial products such as public funds.”
This ruling from the CSRC means that Chinese investors can utilize the e-CNY to buy into public funds and other “financial products” directly from their smartphones any time, day or night, bringing a new use case to the digital yuan that is intended to boost its adoption.
Investors will also be able to access a “payment as settlement” feature, which allows redemption and withdrawal to be made one day in advance. As part of its announcement, the CSRC touted the functionality of the e-CNY, saying it has loadable smart contracts, is traceable, and cannot be illegally forged and copied.
No date has been given for the rollout of this new function, and it is likely that it will take place in stages, beginning with a pilot for “eligible users.” The CSRC is expected to eventually roll the service out across all cities and provinces currently pilot-testing the digital yuan.
This latest development adds to the growing list of use cases and integrations for the digital yuan in provinces and cities throughout China.
In April, the Jiangsu province began using the CBDC in ten new “application scenarios,” which includes its use in the field of public resource transactions. At the beginning of May, Jiangsu began paying civil servants and people who work for public institutions using the digital yuan, a move that affected school teachers, medical staff, technicians, journalists for official medical outlets and state enterprise employees.
In the city of Suzhou, authorities launched a digital yuan application that handles bids on construction projects from construction companies in the region. The platform facilitates financing and loans for enterprises that ultimately win the bidding process.
And in the city of Nanjing, the digital yuan has been integrated for use with the housing provident fund (HPF) system, a mandatory mutual aid platform in China designed to help assist individuals with home financing.
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Nanjing launches government-backed Metaverse platform
In other blockchain-related developments out of China, Nanjing, the capital city of China’s eastern Jiangsu province, launched the “Blockchain Technology and Application Innovation Platform of China” on Monday, a state-backed entity committed to promoting and enhancing metaverse studies throughout the nation.
The new entity is led by the Nanjing University of Information Science and Technology (NUIST) and has a roster of founding members that represent a wide range of academic institutions and metaverse-related companies throughout mainland China.
The purpose of the platform is to bring together the resources of academic institutions and enterprises in China in an effort to bolster research endeavors in metaverse-related fields.
Nanjing first revealed its metaverse strategy in February, saying the region has the goal of creating a thriving industry that attracts global partners and brings in an annual revenue that surpasses 135 billion yuan ($19.13 billion) by the close of 2025.
While China continues to hold a nard-nosed stance on trading and using cryptocurrencies, the metaverse is the one sector of the blockchain ecosystem that the country has been open to fostering growth. Last August, the Beijing municipal government announced a two-year metaverse innovation and development plan that was to be implemented from 2022-2024.
Under the plan, promoting the development of metaverse-related industries and helping Beijing establish a benchmark city designed for the digital economy were the main focus as China looks to be a global leader in metaverse development. The action guidelines laid out by the government included requirements for various districts to build technological infrastructure at a city level and encourage its use in a variety of sectors, including tourism and education.
