The Olympics are here again! So soon? It's not your imagination: the 2020 games in Japan wrapped up in 2021 due to COVID postponement. And speaking of COVID, the 2022 games are in China. The Chinese Communist Party is certainly hoping to spiff up their image after these bruising past two years, and I don't just mean through the impressive spectacles during the festivities itself.
The CCP wants to dazzle the world with its sparkling digital panopticons, the crown jewel being its "central bank digital currency," or CBDC. China's government-controlled digital yuan, also called e-CNY, has been in the making for several years and will be "premiering globally" during the Olympics. The CCP is hoping that foreign journalists will marvel at the efficiency and speed of such a centralized payment system. Unfortunately, I expect much of the Western press to gobble it up.
