Imagine…

The government wants to triple your taxes. Officials decide to just pull it out of your account instantly. (Because they can.)

Couple of clicks is all it would take.

Imagine…

The government thinks you make too much money… or doesn’t like the way you make it.

Even if you run a legit business, shutting you down is simple:

Click. Click. Boom.

That’s what a world run entirely by Central Bank Digital Currencies (CBDCs) could look like.

At their worst, CBDCs give unfettered power to governments to control how you invest, save, and spend your money.

Of course…

CBDCs are Not Crypto

I’ve spent the past week in Denver hobnobbing with some of the crypto elite. The central bankers’ vision of a CBDC is a far cry from the decentralized vision of Satoshi Nakamoto.

While crypto is inherently open, decentralized, and permissionless…

CBDCs -- as conceived by central banks -- would be closed, centralized, and permissioned.

CBDCs don’t represent any major innovation in money…

Because the main purpose of a CBDC wouldn’t be to improve your life, nor would it ultimately improve the financial system.

It’d be about control.

The Quiet Part Out Loud

In 2021, Saule Omarova, a nominee to head the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) -- the federal regulator of the largest banks in the country -- said the quiet part out loud.

Omarova proposed that CBDCs would -- finally! -- allow central banks to deal with inflation more effectively by freezing everyone’s bank accounts whenever they want.

Presto!

Problem solved.

(Omarova also publicly stated that the government should control everyone’s wages and that we should force banks to stop lending to oil and gas companies.)

Fortunately, Omarova didn’t get the position.

But her statements do give us a glimpse of just how power-hungry regulators think.

Meanwhile, the Bank of International Settlements (BIS) -- the central bank of the central banks -- just finished up their CBDC program called “Project Icebreaker.”

The pilot’s aim was to test the “technical feasibility” of conducting cross-border transactions between different CBDCs.

This is it.

Yes, CBDCs are coming.

Whether they come to the US indirectly (through something like stablecoins) or directly (a la the Fed), in one way or another, they’re going to happen.

The BIG question:

Just how much power will they give the government over your financial life?