Stablecoins, Central Bank Digital Currencies and US Dollar Hegemony: The Geopolitical Stake of Innovations in Money and Payments

Fantacci Luca () and Lucio Gobbi
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Fantacci Luca: Research Unit MINTS (Monetary Innovation, New Technologies and Society), Baffi Carefin, Università Bocconi, Milano, Italy

Accounting, Economics, and Law: A Convivium, 2024, vol. 14, issue 2, 173-200

Abstract: Stablecoins are second generation cryptocurrencies, aimed at maintaining their value stable with respect to official currencies. The most famous example is perhaps represented by libra, the cryptocurrency announced by Facebook in 2019 and yet to be issued; the most widespread is tether, with a market capitalization of almost 10 billion dollars and a daily transaction volume of almost 50 billion dollars, which makes it the most used cryptocurrency. The diffusion of stablecoins is hardly surprising. By minimizing volatility – the main flaw of first generation cryptocurrencies, including bitcoin –, stablecoins are expected to play an even more important role on a global scale within a few years. Our contribution deals not with the economic, but specifically with the geopolitical factors that could foster the use of stablecoins for strategic and military purposes. In particular, we focus on how such payment instruments, together with other alternative electronic payment systems, could be used as a means to circumvent economic sanctions and ultimately as a challenge to the hegemony of the US dollar in the international monetary system.

Keywords: stablecoins; cryptocurrencies; international monetary system; economic warfare; economic sanctions (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: E50 F51 F52 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2024
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DOI: 10.1515/ael-2020-0053

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