Former Vice President of the Bank of China, Wang Yongli: Greater attention should be given to the development of stablecoins.

Wang Yongli suggests that the mainland industry and academic circles give greater attention to the development of stablecoins and promote the further development of the digital renminbi.

Source: Beijing Business Daily

May 17-18, 2025, the Tsinghua Wudaokou Global Financial Forum will be held in Shenzhen. At the sub-forum themed "2025 China Economic Outlook," Wang Yongli, former Vice President of the Bank of China and Co-Chairman of Digital China Holdings Limited, stated that in the face of increasingly complex international situations, China needs to solidly focus on its own affairs and accelerate the development of domestic and international dual circulation. Among these, accelerating the cross-border payment and settlement of the Renminbi is an important infrastructure and a significant driving force.

Currently, in terms of the development of cross-border payment and settlement of the Renminbi, our country has achieved many successes, including promoting the development of interbank payment and settlement, establishing our own UnionPay organization, the establishment and development of the Renminbi Cross-Border Payment System (CIPS), and increasing cooperation with Swift.

At the same time, new forms have emerged in the field of cross-border payment and settlement, namely, the development of cryptocurrencies has spurred the growth of fiat stablecoins. Today, the fiat currency payment and settlement system cannot meet the demand for 24-hour online transactions globally, and if cryptocurrencies cannot be exchanged for fiat currencies, their value will be difficult to realize, severely restricting their development. Therefore, in Wang Yongli's view, if cryptocurrencies are legalized, there will need to be corresponding support for the payment and settlement of currency.

Wang Yongli stated that in the United States, the emergence of stablecoins pegged to fiat currency and cryptocurrencies has occurred, with the most typical examples being USDT and USDC. Currently, stablecoins are mainly based on the US dollar, and the impact they bring is worth significant attention from other countries. In particular, stablecoins need to leverage new technologies to enhance the efficiency of currency operations, reduce costs, and ensure stringent risk control.

After the emergence of stablecoins, it can be seen that not only traditional crypto assets like Bitcoin are rapidly developing, but also new fields of digital asset securitization such as NFTs and RWAs are emerging. Therefore, when currencies are driving cross-border payment clearing, they cannot remain limited to traditional service methods and fields. New technologies must be employed, and even some models and technologies from stablecoins need to be learned and adapted to transform the operation of currencies.

Wang Yongli suggested that the industry and academic fields in the mainland should pay more attention to the development of stablecoins and promote the further development of the digital renminbi. "If stablecoins are pegged to a certain fiat currency at par, theoretically, stablecoins are the tokens of the pegged currency. Since tokens can achieve this level, why can't our fiat currency?"

Wang Yongli also reminded that there are various types of US dollar stablecoins available, but having too many US dollar stablecoins is not necessarily a good thing. A more unified operating mechanism needs to be established.

When further discussing the development of financial technology, Wang Yongli pointed out that China is currently leading the world in areas such as mobile payments and digital currencies. However, issues such as redundant construction, data silos, and security risks are becoming "hidden reefs" that hinder high-quality development. Specifically, various institutions building their own payment and data systems have led to chaotic interfaces, increasing interconnectivity costs, and small and medium-sized institutions gradually falling behind; all data assets are essentially controlled by the business operators (such as platform companies) rather than the actual initiators of the business (users or enterprises), which hides the risks of privacy leakage and misuse; unclear ownership of data assets and ambiguous circulation rules restrict the release of digital asset value.

In this regard, Wang Yongli proposed to build an intensive digital infrastructure based on the digital RMB as a model. The digital RMB adopts a unified App architecture from the central bank, which theoretically can aggregate all transaction data and achieve precise traceability at the individual/legal entity level. If this model is extended to identity information management, users may be able to replace physical documents with a digital ID and autonomously set the usage scenarios and validity of the information.

"If there are practical breakthroughs in these areas, the so-called digital currency, digital assets, digital finance, and digital society will undergo fundamental changes," said Wang Yongli.